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Arthur  HCylr  Santa,  A.  J®. 

Prmiirttt  of  S’anthrrn  (EnUcgr,  Petersburg,  Ha. 
Kegrtoteb  from  tlje  magazine  of  liistorg,  Nem  fork,  19X4. 

3Eu$l| tlf  Printing  Hitlj  Abbitiona. 

Aunnat 

1023 

Price,  Fifty  Cents 

W  C  HILL  PRINTING  CO. 

RICHMOND,  VA. 


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“®ljm  (Entfurira  of  an  (®lh  Virginia  uluum” 


JJrtrrsburg  mb  Appomattox 

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Part  I — The  General  Outline.  Part  III — The  City  History. 

Part  II — The  River  History.  Part  IV — The  Civil  War  History. 

Part  V — Story  of  the  Siege  of  Petersburg. 


Petersburg  and  the  Appamattox 

No  city  in  America  has  more  vital 
links  connecting  it  with  the  crucial 
periods  of  the  national  history  than 
has  Petersburg.  It  was  the  objective 
point  of  Cornwallis  when  he  struck 
north  after  his  Carolina  campaign,  and 
it  was  the  objective  point  of  Grant 
when  he  struck  south  after  his  Wil¬ 
derness  Campaign  and  Cold  Harbor. 
In  each  case,  it  was  the  turning  point 
of  destiny,  and  at  Petersburg  were 
enacted  the  opening  scenes  of  the  last 
acts  of  the  two  great  war  dramas  that 
closed  at  Yorktown  and  at  Appomat¬ 
tox. 

Petersburg  is  a  palimpsest  written 
upon  by  each  of  the  five  periods  of 
American  history.  Beneath  the  fair 
writing  of  this  modem  day  there  are 
still  visible  the  red  strokes  of  the  Civil 
war.  Beneath  this,  however,  may  still 
be  read  the  story  of  a  strong  and  cul¬ 
tured  people,  active  and  successful  in 
the  national  period.  Then  come  the 
grim  tracings  of  the  wars  with  Eng¬ 
land,  and  beneath  them  the  sturdy 
strokes  of  the  colonists  have  left  their 
deeds  “writ  large,”  with  markings  of 
the  Indian  period  still  visible  to  the 
careful  eye.  Thus  Petersburg  is  the 
most  interesting  city  in  America,  for 
the  reason  that  each  age  has  left  upon 
it  an  impress  that  has  not  been  ef¬ 
faced  by  the  attrition  of  the  new  era. 

PART  I— GENERAL  OUTLINE 
Three  Centuries 

Here  lived  perhaps  Pocahontas  and 
probably  that  Queene  of  Appamatuck 
that  brought  Smith  water  to  wash  his 
hands.  Nearby  was  the  site  of  the 
East  India  School  established  by  the 
colonists,  and  yet  nearer,  the  site  of 
Pierce’s  plantation,  where  four  of  the 


settlers  were  killed  in  the  first  Indian 
massacre.  Thus,  Petersburg  has  a 
clear  line  of  descent  of  three  centuries. 
It  was  Appamatuck  on  Smith’s  map  of 
Virginia  in  1612;  it  was  Peter’s  Point 
in  the  commercial  history  of  1712;  it 
was  the  Cockade  City  in  the  war  his¬ 
tory  of  1812,  and  it  is  the  Petersburg 
of  world  history  in  1912. 

Early  Events 

Old  Fort  Henry,  built  in  1645-6,  was 
the  nucleus  of  the  original  town,  and 
a  suburb  of  the  city  today  is  said  to 
be  the  site  of  the  Indian  village  de¬ 
stroyed  in  1676  by  the  “Virginia  Reb¬ 
el,”  Nathaniel  Bacon. 

Two  famous  early  expeditions  set 
out  from  Petersburg.  Thomas  Batte 
and  his  companions  set  out  in  1671  to 
explore  the  Western  country  by  com¬ 
mand  of  Major-General  Wood  of  Fort 
Henry,  and  these  men  made  the  first 
crossing  of  the  mountains  by  the  Eng¬ 
lish.  It  was  from  Bellevue,  still  a  sub¬ 
urban  home  of  Petersburg,  that  John 
May  and  Charles  Johnson  departed  in 
1790  for  that  fateful  journey  down  the 
Kanawha  and  Ohio  that  was  to  bring 
death  to  May  and  suffering  and  fame 
to  Johnson,  as  told  in  his  famous  Nar¬ 
rative.  Two  other  expeditions  ended 
at  Petersburg,  for  here  Col.  William 
Byrd  relapsed  into  luxury  on  his  re¬ 
turn  from  the  “Dividing  Line”  in  1728 
and  here  he  laid  the  foundation  of  the 
city  on  his  return  from  the  Land  of 
Eden  in  1733,  as  related  in  the  West- 
over  Manuscripts. 

Not  all  the  historic  sites  of  Peters¬ 
burg,  however,  have  been  made  fam¬ 
ous  by  war  or  daring.  The  arts  of 
peace  and  the  amenities  of  life  have 
also  their  memorials.  Especially  inter¬ 
esting  are  three  famous  banquets  in 
which  Petersburg  showed  its  hospital- 

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ity.  Here  President  Washington  was 
feasted  during  his  southern  tour  in 
1791,  and  here  General  LaFayette  was 
feted  forty  years  after  his  first  visit 
during  his  American  tour  in  1824.  Here 
too,  Vice  President  Aaron  Burr,  on  his 
way  south  in  1805,  was  honored  with 
a  great  banquet,  equal  to  those  that 
marked  the  coming  of  the  Father  of 
his  Country  and  of  the  Hero  of  Two 
Worlds. 

Thus  the  historical  sites,  memorials, 
and  buildings  of  Petersburg,  with  the 
grim  cordon  of  forts  and  battle  lines 
of  two  great  wars,  form  a  series  of 
object  lessons  in  American  life  in 
peace  and  war,  and  the  city  itself  may 
fairly  be  called  an  epitome  of  Ameri¬ 
can  history. 

Famous  Sites 

* 

Here  are  found  Indian  relics,  sites 
and  traditions;  one  of  the  first  co¬ 
lonial  forts,  the  first  permanent  out¬ 
post  south  of  the  James;  an  early 
trading  station,  from  which  the  city 
derives  its  name;  the  two  famous 
“Castles”  of  the  founder’s  grandson; 
old  taverns,  duelling  grounds  and  race¬ 
courses;  sites  of  the  Revolutionary  pe¬ 
riod,  made  famous  by  the  great  lead¬ 
ers  on  both  sides;  a  fine  colonial  man¬ 
sion  used  as  headquarters  by  a  Brit¬ 
ish  general  and  described  by  the  Mar¬ 
quis  de  Chastellux  in  his  Travels;  the 
site  of  the  historic  home  in  which  Gen¬ 
eral  Phillips  died;  the  old  bridge,  torn 
up,  rebuilt  and  burned  by  the  contend¬ 
ing  armies  on  two  successive  days; 
the  church  where  Whitfield  preached 
his  sermon  to  critical  ears,  and  the 
spot  where  the  fiery  preaching  of  the 
evangelist  Williams  was  cooled  by  a 
fire  hose. 

About  1800  began  another  series  of 
historic  sites.  Here  was  the  early 
theater,  where  the  Petersburg  Thes¬ 
pians  acted,  succeeded  by  one  of  the 
most  famous  early  theatres  in  Ameri¬ 
ca,  which  was  visited  by  all  of  the 
great  actors  of  the  earlier  part  of  the 
century.  Here  Burk  wrote  the  first 
early  history  of  Virginia  and  fell  in  a 
duel.  Asbury’s  Journal  tells  how  Pe¬ 
tersburg  was  often  visited  in  his  itin¬ 
erary  and  how  he  and  Bishop  Coke 
found  warm  welcome  here.  The  law 
office  of  General  Winfield  Scott  may 
still  be  seen,  as  may  the  home  where 
Calhoun’s  body  lay  in  state  at  a  later 
time.  The  very  streets  of  the  city  in 


definite  series  record  the  national  pe¬ 
riod  of  American  history. 

The  Civil  war  left  its  impress  upon 
the  city  and  made  a  third  group  of  his¬ 
toric  sites.  The  three  headquarters  of 
General  Lee  mark  the  gradual  reces¬ 
sion  during  the  longest  siege  in  Amer¬ 
ican  history.  President  Davis  stopped 
here  on  his  way  to  Richmond,  and 
Lincoln  and  Grant  made  two  homes 
famous  by  their  visits.  The  four  lines 
of  the  fortifications  may  still  be  traced 
around  the  city,  and  here  were  scenes 
of  great  battles  and  of  the  famous  ex¬ 
plosion  of  the  Crater.  Perhaps  most 
striking  and  reverend  of  all,  within 
sight  of  the  Crater  itself,  stands  a 
beautiful  old  colonial  church  and 
churchyard,  containing  memorials, 
graves,  and  epitaphs  of  wonderful  in¬ 
terest. 

Old  Bland  ford  Church 

Probably  the  most  unique  memorial 
in  America  is  this  church,  known  as 
old  Blandford  or  Bristol  Parish  Church. 
Few  spots  may  be  compared  wdth  it 
in  sacredness  or  inspiration.  “Stand¬ 
ing  in  quiet  beauty  amid  acres  of 
heroic  dust”  it  thrills  the  visitor  as 
does  no  other  spot  in  America  save 
Mount  Vernon  itself.  Around  it  have 
surged  the  combats  of  two  great  strug¬ 
gles,  but  two  war  dates  stand  out  in 
local  history.  One  is  the  Ninth  of 
June,  1864,  when  the  volunteer  citizen- 
soldiers  held  back  Kautz’s  raid;  and 
the  other  is  the  thirtieth  of  July,  1864, 
when  the  Burnside  Mine  was  exploded 
and  the  Crater  fight  took  place.  Both 
of  these  events  have  fitting  memorials 
here,  where  thirty-thousand  Confede¬ 
rate  dead  lie  buried,  while  tlrere  are 
close  at  hand  stately  monuments  to 
the  thousands  of  Federal  soldiers  that 
rest  in  the  Federal  cemeteries. 

History  and  Romance 

Romance  and  pathos  combine  with 
history  around  the  old  church,  and 
about  it  have  ebbed  and  flowed  the 
very  life  tides  of  the  city  and  nation. 
In  the  southeast  comer  of  the  church¬ 
yard,  under  foilage  of  ivy  and  peri¬ 
winkles,  lies  buried  General  Phillips, 
called  by  Jefferson  “the  proudest  man 
of  the  proudest  nation  on  earth.”  Here 
it  was  that  Baron  Steuben  made  his 
first  stand  against  Phillips  and  Arnold 
in  the  defense  of  Petersburg  in  the 
Revolution.  Here  it  was  that  the 
Washington  memorial  service  was 


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Rare  Book  Collection 

UNC**Chap«l  Hill 


held  in  1799,  and  here  in  1826  was 
held  the  Jefferson  memorial  service. 
Parson  Syme  was  interrupted  in  this 
service  by  the  alarm  of  the  great  fire, 
second  only  to  the  greater  fire  of  1815. 
In  the  shadow  of  these  walls  was 
fought  the  Jeffreys-Johnson  duel  in 
1795,  and  the  Boisseau-Adams  duel  in 
1821.  In  the  church  itself  in  1844  An- 
tommattie  killed  himself  for  love,  and 
just  outside  the  churchyard  (as  a  sui¬ 
cide  might  not  be  buried  in  holy 
ground)  stands  the  tombstone,  paid 
for  with  money  collected  in  Corsica, 
with  the  inscription,  “Honor  was  his 
only  vice.” 

In  the  Civil  war,  the  bloody  lines 
of  circumvallation  barely  missed  the 
confines  of  the  cemetery,  and  at  least 
one  monument  was  shattered  by  the 
artillery  fire. 

A  Virginia  Pantheon 

Thus,  old  Blandford  church,  with 
its  Colonial  and  Revolutionary  history, 
with  its  simple  memorial  tablet  to  an 
early  rector,  with  its  beautiful  D.  A. 
R.  memorial  in  honor  of  the  men  of 
the  Revolution,  with  its  eleven  Tiffany 
Apostle  windows  commemorating  the 
Confederate  States  (and  two  to  Mis¬ 
souri  and  Maryland),  with  its  elo¬ 
quently  simple  U.  D.  C.  honor  roll  of 
the  citizen-heroes  of  the  Ninth  of  June, 
with  its  stately  marble  tablet  to  the 
immortal  Crater  Legion,  and  with  its 
touching  memorial  to  the  leader  of 
their  charge,  seems  a  real  focus  of 
American  history  and  a  veritable  Pan¬ 
theon  of  Confederate  heroism. 

The  Burk  cenotaph  and  the  Bland¬ 
ford  Poem  connect  the  church  also 
with  American  literature.  The  famous 
lines  on  the  old  church  make  the  near¬ 
est  approach  to  an  American  “Elegy.’ 
This  poem  is  certainly  the  most  beau¬ 
tiful  spontaneous  tribute  to  any  church 
in  America.  The  cenotaph  to  John 
Daly  Burk,  the  fiery  Irishman  and  the 
author  of  the  most  famous  early  his¬ 
tory  of  Virginia,  is  just  outside  the 
walls  of  the  church,  and  in  the  dis¬ 
tance  may  be  seen  Fleet’s  Hill,  where 
Burk  fell  in  a  duel. 

The  McRae  Monument  near  at  hand 
completes  the  war  memorials  of  the 
church.  Not  only  does  the  inscription 
tell  of  the  valor  of  the  Petersburg 
Volunteers  of  1812,  but  the  five  panels 
of  the  enclosure  show  also  the  arms 
that  they  bore.  The  flint-lock  muskets 
and  sabers  crossed;  the  stiff  military 
cap  and  pompon;  the  belt  and  ammuni¬ 


tion-box;  the  garlands  and  wreaths; 
the  American  shield  with  the  eagle 
and  cannon;  the  battle-axes  at  the  cor¬ 
ners  and  the  seventeen  stars  above  the 
rail;  all  these  things  bespeak  the  ro¬ 
bust  militant  patriotism  of  an  earlier 
day.  Here  all  the  panoply  of  war  is 
displayed  in  this  memorial  of  the  dar¬ 
ing  of  cne  company,  while  yonder  in 
the  church  the  deeds  of  tens  of  thous¬ 
ands  are  commemorated  by  simple 
tablets  and  holy  emblems,  with  not  a 
sign  of  war  to  mar  the  sacred  pre¬ 
cincts. 

PART  II— THE  RIVER  HISTORY 
The  Appomattox 

The  story  of  Petersburg  begins  nat¬ 
urally  with  the  river.  The  Appomat¬ 
tox,  like  other  Virginia  rivers,  was  both 
an  entering  wedge  of  civilization  and  a 
colonial  link  and  highway.  Here  Peters¬ 
burg  history  begins  with  the  planting 
of  a  fort  by  the  settlers  in  the  time  of 
Governor  Berkley,  and  the  site  of  Old 
Fort  Henry  is  today  the  spot  of  earl¬ 
iest  authentic  interest.  The  fifteen- 
mile  river  stretch  from  Bellevue  just 
above  Petersburg,  to  City  Point  at  the 
junction  of  the  James,  is  scarcely  sur¬ 
passed  in  America  for  variety  and  in¬ 
tensity  of  interest.  Every  bluff  was  a 
plantation  home  and  every  wharf  was 
a  port  of  entry. 

Matoax  to  Fort  Henry 

Randolph  of  Roanoke  was  born  on 
these  banks,  and  his  father  and 
mother  lie  buried  within  sound  of  the 
falls  of  the  river.  These  two  graves, 
with  their  quaint  Latin  inscriptions, 
lend  special  interest  to  Matoax  above 
the  falls,  Matoax  was  the  private  name 
of  Pocahontas,  and  it  was  from  Ma¬ 
toax  that  John  Randolph’s  mother  fled 
with  him  to  Bizarre  at  the  time  of 
Arnold’s  threatened  invasion.  Nearby 
are  Olive  Hill,  the  Atkinson  home,  and 
Bellevue,  the  home  of  John  May,  where 
Johnston’s  Narrative  opens.  Across 
the  river  from  Matoax  the  line  of  sub¬ 
urban  estates  begins  with  two  other 
Atkinson  homes,  well-preserved  Mans¬ 
field  and  Sysonby.  Following  the  river 
to  the  city  limits,  the  first  historic 
mansion  of  the  colonial  days  is  Bat¬ 
tersea,  the  home  of  the  Banisters. 
This  home,  an  excellent  example  of 
colonial  architecture,  was  occupied 
during  the  Revolution  by  the  British 


under  Simcoe,  and  was  visited  after 
the  war  by  the  Marquis  de  Chastellux 
and  was  described  by  him  in  his  Trav¬ 
els. 

On  a  high  bluff  at  the  foot  of  the 
falls  stand  the  Dunlop  house,  built  on 
the  site  of  Old  Fort  Henry;  and  direct¬ 
ly  across  the  river  is  Fleet’s  Hill, 
where  Burk  fell  in  his  famous  duel 
with  Coquebert  in  1808. 

Campbell’s  Bridge 

Here  Campbell’s  bridge  spans  the 
narrow  gorge,  and  it  was  at  this  bridge 
that  Burk’s  eleven-year  old  son,  John, 
learned  of  his  father’s  death.  He  had 
spent  the  week  end  at  Olive  Hill  with 
his  schoolmate,  Tom  Atkinson,  and  on 
that  Monday  morning  the  two  boys 
had  seen  the  duelling  ground  wet  with 
blood  as  they  came  past  Fleet’s  Hill  on 
their  way  to  school  in  town.  John 
Junius  Burk  was  later  Judge  Burk,  of 
Louisiana,  when  a  Petersburg  Robert¬ 
son  became  Governor  of  that  State, 
and  Thomas  Pleasants  Atkinson  after¬ 
wards  wrote  his  reminiscences  of  Pe¬ 
tersburg  in  the  interesting  “Moratock 
Papers.” 

It  was  over  Campbell’s  bridge  that 
General  Lee’s  army  passed  on  the 
night  of  April  2nd,  1865,  in  the  retreat 
that  ended  at  Appomattox. 

Peter’s  Point 

A  short  distance  down  on  the  south 
bank  and  in  the  very  heart  of  the  city 
itself  is  the  birthplace  of  Petersburg, 
the  old  Trading  Station  of  Peter 
Jones,  from  whom  the  city  derived  its 
name  long  before  1733,  when  Colonel 
William  Byrd  with  his  four  compan¬ 
ions  “laid  the  foundation”  of  the  two 
cities,  Petersburg  and  Richmond,  as 
told  in  his  Westover  Manuscripts.  It 
is  worthy  of  note  that  two  Petersburg¬ 
ers,  Banister  and  Jones,  were  among 
the  four  companions  of  Colonel  Byrd 
in  this  “founding”  of  the  two  cities, 
and  while  “Shocco’s”  became  Rich¬ 
mond,  “Peter’s  Point’’  became  Peters¬ 
burg. 

Opposite  the  City 

Further  down  the  river  on  the 
northern  bank  are  the  high  bluffs  over¬ 
looking  the  city,  now  called  Colonial 
Heights.  Here  may  be  seen  the  re¬ 
markable  box  hedge  at  Oak  Hill,  said 
to  be  the  oldest  in  America.  This  is 


on  Archer’s  (or  Hector’s  or  Dunn’s) 
Hill,  from  which  Lafayette  shelled 
Petersburg  during  the  Revolution, 
when  it  was  occupied  by  the  British 
under  Arnold,  Phillips,  and  Cornwallis. 
Here  was  Hector’s  Spring  and  the 
bridge  over  which  the  gay  cavalcades 
came  trooping  on  the  Fourth  of  July 
long  ago.  Winding  down  from  Colo¬ 
nial  Heights  is  the  road  along  which 
General  Washington  came  with  his  es¬ 
cort  of  honor  on  his  historic  visit  in 
1791,  and  along  which  a  third  of  a 
century  later,  LaFayette  came  into 
Petersburg  in  1824,  when  he  was  wel¬ 
comed  as  a  hero  by  the  city.  On  the 
next  bluff  is  historic  Violet  Bank,  the 
home  of  the  Shores,  the  first  head¬ 
quarters  of  General  Lee  during  the 
siege  of  Petersburg.  The  Conjuror’s 
Neck  Road  leads  from  Violet  Bank 
past  Roslyn,  the  home  of  the  Gam¬ 
bles  to  Brick  House,  the  home  of  the 
Kennons.  In  the  lowlands  here  oppo¬ 
site  the  city  is  the  suburb  of  Pocahon¬ 
tas,  once  “Witten  Town,”  where  stood 
for  years  an  interesting  relic  of  Indian 
times,  the  “Pocahontas  Basin,”  now 
transferred  to  the  Courthouse. 


Pocahontas  Bridge 

Connecting  this  suburb  of  Pocahon¬ 
tas  with  the  city  is  the  historic  Poca¬ 
hontas  bridge.  Tom  up  on  April  26th, 
1781,  by  the  retreating  Americans  un¬ 
der  Steuben,  rebuilt  on  the  next  day 
for  the  passage  of  the  English  under 
Phillips,  and  then  burned  while  the 
shipping  flamed  in  the  harbor,  its 
ruins  were  seen  by  the  Marquis  de 
Chastellux,  when  in  the  same  year  he 
visited  Spencer’s  Tavern  beside  the 
bridge  and  praised  the  fish  and  the 
music  of  the  tavern.  Here  in  1812,  an 
armed  schooner  fired  a  salute  of  honor 
to  the  departing  Petersburg  Volun¬ 
teers;  and  here  too,  in  1858,  the  Pe¬ 
tersburg  Artillery  fired  a  salute  of 
thirteen  guns  on  the  arrival  of  the 
Southern  Star,  the  first  steamship 
that  ever  came  to  Petersburg,  about 
ten  years  after  the  first  telegraph  mes¬ 
sage  was  sent  from  Petersburg  to  Nor¬ 
folk.  Below  the  bridge  lies  the  har¬ 
bor,  and  adjoining  the  town  is  the 
suburb  of  Blandford,  which  was  once  a 
center  of  industry  and  fashion.  Here 
Haffey  established  the  first  nail  fac¬ 
tory  in  this  part  of  the  country,  and 
here  the  Old  Tavern  and  Boyd’s  Tav¬ 
ern  and  the  Rising  Sun  were  places  of 


6 


resort.  Here  a  famous  Petersburger 
had  his  law  office  in  a  modest  build¬ 
ing,  still  standing,  before  he  became 
the  hero  of  two  wars  as  General  Win¬ 
field  Scott. 


Below  the  City 

Below  the  city,  the  river  flows  on 
past  Clifton  and  Brick  House  on  the 
left  bank,  and  past  Greencroft,  the 
home  of  the  Skipwiths,  and  Puddle- 
dock,  the  home  of  the  Stiths  and  Her¬ 
berts,  to  famous  Port  Walthall.  This 
was  once  the  port  both  of  Petersburg 
and  of  Richmond,  whence  the  Virginia 
flour  was  shipped  for  decades  for  the 
South  American  trade.  This  place  de¬ 
rived  its  name  from  the  Walthalls, 
whose  Valley  Farm  house  was  said  to 
be  the  first  built  between  the  Appo¬ 
mattox  and  the  James.  Almost  oppo¬ 
site  is  Gatling’s  or  Spring  Hill,  where 
the  sunken  area  still  shows  the  effect 
of  the  mysterious  landslide  of  twenty 
years  ago.  Then  comes  classic  Tuscu- 
lum,  the  home  of  the  Gilliams,  on  the 
right,  and  historic  Cobb’s,  home  of  the 
Bollings  on  the  left,  where  the  first 
deaf-mute  school  in  America  was  es¬ 
tablished.  This  was  the  headquarters 
of  General  Butler  during  the  Civil 
war.  Here  he  had  his  signal  tower 
visible  from  Petersburg,  and  just  be¬ 
low  is  the  lofty  Point  of  Rocks. 

Broadway 

Below  this  Point,  nine  miles  from 
Petersburg,  is  historic  Broadway, 
where  landed  the  French  Huguenot 
refugees  for  whom  the  Assembly 
made  provision  of  food  and  land  and 
who  later  settled  in  Powhatan  county. 
Here  General  Smallwood  checked  the 
first  advance  of  Arnold’s  fleet  in  1781, 
and  here  General  Grant  had  his  pon¬ 
toon  bridge  in  the  Civil  war.  Over 
this  pontoon  bridge,  on  the  night  of 
the  Ninth  of  June,  1864,  were  march¬ 
ed  the  Petersburg  soldiers  captured  in 
Kautz’s  Raid,  and  one  of  the  prisoners, 
Anthony  Keiley,  has  told  the  story  of 
this  march  and  of  his  interesting  in¬ 
terviews  with  Kautz  and  Butler. 

From  Broadway,  the  river  flows 
on  past  Mitchell’s  and  past  Caw- 
son’s,  the  early  home  of  the  Blands 
where  John  Randolph  was  bom,  and 
past  Kippax,  the  first  home  of  the 
Bollings,  until  it  broadens  out  in  sight 


of  beautiful  Appamattox,  for  nearly 
three  centuries  owned  by  the  Eppes 
family.  Here  is  quiet  City  Point, 
twice  alive  with  hostile  troops  and 
munitions,  while  on  the  further  bank 
lies  Bermuda  Hundred  and  between 
them  the  picturesque  Appomattox 
blends  into  the  stately  James. 


City  Point  and  Petersburg 

Both  Bermuda  Hundred  and  City 
Point  are  closely  knit  to  Petersburg 
history.  It  was  at  Bermuda  Hun¬ 
dred,  the  1611  settlement  of  Sir 
Thomas  Dale,  that  the  first  Bristol 
Parish  church  was  built,  succeeded 
by  the  Ferry  Chapel,  nearer  to  Pe¬ 
tersburg,  and  later  (in  1735)  by  the 
Wells  Hill  church  or  Old  Blandford 
itself,  as  told  in  Bishop  Meade’s  “Old 
Churches.”  City  Point,  or  Charles  City 
Point,  just  missed  being  the  first  set¬ 
tlement,  as  Newport  left  his  ships 
on  his  arrival  in  Virginia  and  coast¬ 
ed  in  a  shallop  to  this  point  in  his 
exploration,  before  returning  and 
bringing  his  ships  further  up  the 
river  to  make  a  landing  at  James¬ 
town.  Here  the  East  India  school 
was  established  in  1621  to  be  a  feeder 
to  Henrico  college.  In  the  Revolution, 
it  was  at  City  Point  that  part  of  the 
British  forces  of  Phillips  landed  for 
the  advance  on  Petersburg,  while  the 
sick  leader  himself  was  borne  by  car¬ 
riage  from  Westover.  In  slave  days, 
the  Petersburg  officers  here  took 
steamer  in  1858  in  their  hurried  pur¬ 
suit  of  the  kidnapping  schooner  “Kez- 
iah,”  which  was  bearing  off  five  run¬ 
away  slaves.  The  steamer  in  which  the 
pursuit  was  made  was  called  the  W. 
W.  Townes.  City  Point  was  Grant’s 
base  of  supplies  in  the  siege  of  Pe¬ 
tersburg,  and  he  built  from  this  point 
a  military  railroad  of  twelve  or  fifteen 
miles,  entirely  within  his  direct  and 
reverse  line  of  fortifications  around 
Petersburg.  Here  President  Lincoln 
landed  on  his  visit  to  the  evacuated 
city. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  while 
the  James  lost  its  Indian  name  of 
Powhatan  and  kept  the  royal  Eng¬ 
lish  title,  the  Appomattox  threw  off 
its  imported  name  of  the  Bristol  and 
reverted  to  the  original  Indian  name. 
The  old  English  name  of  the  river  is 
still  preserved,  however,  in  the  name 
of  Bristol  parish  mentioned  above. 


7 


PART  III— THE  CITY  HISTORY. 

Bollingbrook 

These  river  estates,  however,  with 
all  their  charm  of  colonial  life  and 
cheer,  are  second  in  interest  to  the 
historic  mansions  in  Petersburg  it¬ 
self.  Even  more  famous  than  the 
Battersea  house  already  mentioned 
is  East  Hill  or  Bollingbrook,  the  site 
of  the  colonial  home' of  the  Bollings. 
This  house  was  twice  the  headquarters 
of  the  British  during  the  Revolution. 
All  the  inmates  had  to  take  refuge  in 
the  cellar  during  the  shelling  by  La¬ 
fayette,  and  one  cannon-ball  passed 
through  the  house  and  killed  the  cook. 
Here  Arnold,  with  his  Saratoga  limp, 
dandled  the  children,  and  here  Gen¬ 
eral  Phillips,  lying  on  his  death-bed, 
complained  that  the  Americans  would 
not  even  let  him  die  in  peace.  From 
this  home  Cornwallis  wrote  in  boast¬ 
ful  vein  of  Lafayette,  that  “the  boy’’ 
could  not  escape  him  now. 

The  Castles 

Two  famous  wooden  “castles”  in 
the  city  were  built  by  Peter  Jones 
the  Second,  grandson  of  Peter  Jones 
the  trader,  and  both  are  now  occu¬ 
pied  as  residences.  The  first  is  “Folly 
Castle”  on  Washington  street,  built 
in  1763  and  now  occupied  by  Mr.  Munt. 
This  house  was  originally  named  from 
the  folly  of  its  then  childless  owner  in 
building  so  large  a  house.  Davis 
street,  which  bordered  the  estate,  was 
formerly  called  Folly  street. 

The  second  of  the  “castles”  is  “Stir¬ 
ling  Castle”  on  High  street,  now  the 
residence  of  Mrs.  Spotswood.  This 
was  originally  the  country  house  of 
Peter  Jones  the  Second,  but  after  his 
death  his  daughter  had  the  house 
moved  to  Petersburg  and  erected  on 
the  spot  where  it  now  stands.  Two 
other  wooden  mansions  of  somewhat 
similar  style  have  an  interesting  his¬ 
tory.  One  is  the  Bennet- Shore  man¬ 
sion  at  the  comer  of  Adams  and  Mar¬ 
shall  streets,  now  the  Orr  home.  The 
original  house,  built  more  than  a  cen¬ 
tury  ago,  was  an  exact  copy  of  the 
Shore  home  known  as  Violet  Bank, 
built  a  few  years  earlier  but  later  de¬ 
stroyed  by  fire.  On  Adams  street  be¬ 
hind  the  Orr  house  is  the  old  Johnson- 
Wyatt  mansion,  now  occupied  by  Mr. 
Barham,  where  the  body  of  Calhoun 
lay  in  state. 


Another  attractive  old-time  mansion 
of  local  interest  is  the  West  Hill 
house,  with  its  solid  basement  and 
quaint  dormer  windows.  This  house 
was  built  by  the  Bollings  for  the  stew¬ 
ard  of  their  estate,  and  it  faced  their 
long  line  of  tobacco  warehouses  that 
stood  on  West  Hill. 

The  Residency 

Prison  Hill  Mansion  on  Tabb  street 
has  for  years  been  one  of  the  inter¬ 
esting  sights  of  the  city,  but  it  is  still 
somewhat  a  puzzle.  So  far  as  may  be 
learned,  this  handsome  two-story 
wooden  mansion,  with  a  lofty  stone 
and  brick  basement,  was  formerly 
used  as  a  residency  or  official  home  by 
some  agent  of  the  crown  in  colonial 
days.  It  stood  in  the  midst  of  spac¬ 
ious  grounds  extending  from  the  High 
School  building  on  the  south  to  the 
creek  on  the  north.  The  two  stone 
pillars  of  the  entrance  gates  still  stand 
at  the  end  of  Marshall  street.  A  wind¬ 
ing  driveway  led  to  the  front  of  the 
house,  and  two  curving  staircases  led 
to  the  porch  of  the  mansion,  which 
was  perched  high  above  the  stone 
basement,  where  may  still  be  seen  the 
cells  used  for  the  detention  of  pris¬ 
oners.  This  arrangement  of  a  dwell¬ 
ing-house  over  a  prison  seems  strange 
today,  but  the  same  plan  may  be  seen 
in  the  sheriff’s  house  standing  in 
Blandford,  which  was  prison  below 
and  residence  above. 

The  Historians 

The  historian,  John  Daly  Burk,  had 
no  home  of  his  own,  but  boarded  at 
the  house  of  Mrs.  Swa yle  (or  Swail) 
on  Old  Street,  near  the  old  LeMoine 
house.  Burk  was  a  lawyer  with  an  of¬ 
fice  on  Bollingbrook  Street  near  Phoe¬ 
nix.  He  was  a  great  friend  of  John 
Randolph,  who  aided  him  in  securing 
materials  for  his  history.  His  famous 
quarrel  with  Coquebert  at  the  time  of 
the  Berlin  and  Milan  Decrees  occurred 
in  the  Powell  Tavern  on  Sycamore 
Street,  where  the  Rosenstock  Stores 
now  stand.  He  fought  the  duel  in  a 
ravine  back  of  the  Normal  School  and 
was  buried  with  military  honors  in  an 
unmarked  grave  at  Cedar  Grove,  the 
residence  of  General  Joseph  Jones  in 
the  southwestern  part  of  the  city.  This 
land,  later  the  property  of  A.  G.  Mcll- 
waine,  was  near  the  Mount  Airy  Rail¬ 
road  Shops. 


8 


The  duel  was  not  the  only  one  that 
interrupted  the  writing  of  this  Vir¬ 
ginia  history.  Skelton  Jones,  who  be¬ 
gan  the  fourth  volume,  also  fell  on  the 
“field  of  honor”  after  writing  sixty- 
three  pages,  and  the  history  was  com¬ 
pleted  by  Girardin. 

The  second  Petersburg  historian, 
often  called  the  Virginia  Old  Mor¬ 
tality,.  was  Charles  Campbell.  He 
had  his  residence  here,  as  his  father 
was  the  first  bookseller  of  the  city. 
In  addition  to  his  excellent  History 
of  Virginia,  Campbell  wrote  also  a 
Life  of  Burk  and  many  antiquarian 
essays. 

Three  other  Virginia  historians 
should  be  mentioned,  as  they  were 
rectors  here.  Both  William  Stith, 
who  wrote  a  History  of  Virginia, 
and  Bishop  William  Meade,  who 
wrote  “Old  Churches  and  Families 
of  Virginia,’’  served  for  a  short  time 
as  rectors;  Stith  at  Old  Blandford 
in  1739,  and  Meade  at  St.  Paul’s  in 
1839.  A  third  rector  of  long  ser¬ 
vice,  Phillip  Slaughter,  wrote  the  His¬ 
tory  of  Bristol  Parish  and  also  of  St. 
George’s  and  of  St.  Mark’s  Parishes. 

The  Warriors 

Within  the  city  was  also  the  home 
of  Captain  McRae,  who  led  the  Peters¬ 
burg  volunteers  in  the  War  of  1812, 
and  who  won  for  Petersburg  from 
President  Madison  the  title  of  “The 
Cockade  City  of  the  Union.”  Here  is 
also  the  home  of  Colonel  F.  H.  Archer, 
who  led  the  Petersburg  volunteers  in 
the  Mexican  war,  and  also  commanded 
the  old  men  and  boys  on  the  ninth  of 
June.  On  Market  street  is  also  the 
residence  of  General  Mahone,  the  hero 
of  the  battle  of  the  Crater.  .  It  is 
necessary,  however,  to  go  outside  the 
city  limits  to  a  farm  beyond  the  May- 
field  estate  to  find  the  birthplace  of 
the  Petersburgher  most  famous  in  the 
war  annals  of  America.  Here  was 
born  General  Winfield  Scott,  hero  of 
the  War  of  1812  and  of  the  Mexican 
War  and  commander-in-chief  of  the 
American  forces  at  the  opening  of  the 
Civil  war.  General  Scott  had  a  law 
office  in  Blandford  and  later  in  Peters¬ 
burg,  probably  on  Bollingbrook  street, 
until  he  abandoned  the  law  for  the 
army  in  1808.  That  he  was  not  en¬ 
tirely  a  hero  in  the  eyes  of  his  fellows, 
however,  is  shown  by  the  famous 
toast  of  a  distinguished  Peters¬ 
burgher,  Benjamin  Watkins  Leigh, 


at  the  Eagle  Tavern  dinner,  given  in 
honor  of  General  Scott  after  the  War 
of  1812.  In  the  midst  of  the  chorus 
of  praise  of  the  hero  of  Chippewa  and 
Lundy’s  Lane,  Leigh’s  simple  toast 
was,  “Well,  Scott,  Here’s  to  Luck.” 

Two  Petersburg  stories  of  General 
Scott  may  be  added.  At  Vera  Cruz 
after  the  Mexican  War,  he  was  urged 
to  return  home  in  one  of  the  larger 
vessels  provided  for  the  transport  of 
troops,  but  generously  refused  to  do 
so,  on  the  ground  that  he  might  thus 
delay  the  return  home  of  many  a 
brave  soldier  anxious  for  a  sight  of 
his  dear  ones.  He  embarked  on  the 
brig  “Petersburg,”  of  166  tons,  and  on 
the  voyage  yellow  fever  broke  out 
and  Scott  caught  the  fever  and  nar¬ 
rowly  escaped  death. 

On  the  other  hand  may  be  men¬ 
tioned  the  traditions  still  current, 
that  the  general  was  a  pompous  man, 
rather  proud  of  his  appearance,  and 
this  seems  to  be  borne  out  by  the 
well  authenticated  story  of  the  no¬ 
tice  in  a  Petersburg  paper  that  on  a 
certain  day  General  Scott  “may  be 
seen  at  Powell’s  hotel  in  the  full 
uniform  that  he  wore  in  the  Mexi¬ 
can  War.” 

Civil  War  Mansions 

Three  of  the  mansions  of  Peters¬ 
burg  are  especially  famous  in  the  his¬ 
tory  of  the  Civil  war.  These  are  the 
Beasley  mansion  on  High  street,  in¬ 
teresting  as  the  second  headquarters 
of  General  Lee;  the  Seward  Mansion 
on  Market  street,  where  occurred  the 
last  meeting  of  Lincoln  and  Grant 
before  the  surrender  of  Lee;  and  the 
Centre  Hill  mansion,  which  still  shows 
the  effects  of  the  shelling  of  Battery 
Number  Five,  having  a  cannon-hole 
in  the  northern  wall  and  bullet-holes 
in  the  attic  doors.  This  was  General 
Hartstuff’s  headquarters,  and  it  was 
here  that  Lincoln,  just  after  the  evacu¬ 
ation,  made  his  famous  mot,  “Gen¬ 
eral  Grant  seems  to  have  attended 
sufficiently  to  the  matter  of  rent.” 

One  of  the  interesting  features  of 
this  mansion  is  the  underground  pas¬ 
sage,  which  led  out  to  Henry  street 
and  was  used  as  an  entrance  by  visi¬ 
tors.  The  broad  passage  terminated 
on  Henry  street  in  a  pavillion  or  porte 
cochere,  where  the  visitors  dismount¬ 
ed  from  their  carriages,  entering  the 
house  on  the  basement  level  and  go¬ 
ing  upstairs  to  the  parlor  floor,  in 


9 


the  English  rather  than  the  Ameri¬ 
can  style.  Some  fifty  feet  of  this  pas¬ 
sage  may  still  be  enterd,  and  it  was 
lighted  from  above  so  as  to  be  quite 
bright  and  well  ventilated. 

The  Centre  Hill  Banquet 

This  Centre  Hill  Mansion,  the  resi¬ 
dence  of  Mr.  Charles  Hall  Davis,  was 
the  fitting  scene  of  a  notable  aftermath 
of  the  Civil  War,  when  it  was  tendered 
to  the  city  of  Petersburg  for  the  banquet 
and  reception  to  President  Taft  on  the 
occasion  of  the  dedication  of  the  Hart- 
ranft  Monument  at  Fort  Mahone  in 
honor  of  the  Pennsylvania  soldiers  of 
the  Civil  War.  After  the  parade  and 
dedication  ceremonies,  an  al  fresco,  lunch¬ 
eon  was  served  on  the  Centre  Hill  lawn 
to  one  thousand  distinguished  guest, 
seated  at  a  hundred  tables  of  living  turf. 
The  speakers’  table  extended  along  the 
fifty-foot  south  portico,  looking  out  on 
the  lawn,  and  here,  with  Governor  Swan¬ 
son  as  tostmaster,  three  notable  toasts 
were  given:  “Petersburg,”  by  Hon.  Will¬ 
iam  B.  Mcllwaine;  “Virginia,”  by  Dr. 
Edwin  A.  Alderman,  president  of  the 
University  of  Virginia;  and  “Pennsyl¬ 
vania,”  by  Governor  Edwin  S.  Stuart, 
of  Pennsylvania.  The  city’s  guests  then 
passed  through  the  mansion  to  the  north 
lawn,  where  President  Taft  made  his 
eloquent  address  to  twenty  thousand 
people.  In  the  evening  a  brilliant  recept¬ 
ion  and  lawn  fete  followed,  when  Admiral 
Sigsbee  spoke  on  the  “American  Sailor,” 
and  Ambassador  Jusserand  on  the 
“American  Soldier.”  This  Civil  War 
mansion  was  a  most  fitting  scene  for 
such  a  reunion  of  the  Blue  and  Gray, 
and  the  ideal  setting,  the  distinguished 
guest,  and  the  eloquent  speakers,  made 
this  the  most  brilliant  banquet  ever  given 
in  Virginia. 

Four  Famous  Taverns 

Four  old  taverns  of  Petersburg 
have  a  part  in  history.  Probably  the 
oldest  was  the  Golden  Ball  Tavern 
on  Old  street,  where  may.  still  be 
seen  a  part  of  the  old  building  at 
the  corner  of  Market  street,  almost 
opposite  Peter  Jones’s  Trading  Sta¬ 
tion.  Here  the  British  officers  were 
quartered  during  the  Revolution,  and 
here  the  first  famous  city  banquet 
was  given  to  President  Washington  in 
1791.  This  visit  is  also  notable  for 
the  reason  that  at  Petersburg  Wash¬ 
ington  told  his  only  recorded  untruth, 
in  fixing  his  time  of  departure  “before 
eight”  and  leaving  at  five  to  avoid  the 


dust  of  an  escort.  At  this  time  the 
Golden  Ball  Tavern  had  become  Du- 
rell’s  Tavern,  and  in  1823  it  had  be¬ 
come  Tench’s  Tavern.  It  was  probably 
as  Tench’s  Tavern  that  it  had  its  iron 
gong  struck  at  noon  by  an  iron  ne¬ 
gro  with  an  iron  mace.  Another  tav¬ 
ern  of  Revolutionary  fame  was  the 
Long  Omary,  a  mile  west  of  the  cen¬ 
ter  of  the  city,  where  were  the  head¬ 
quarters  of  the  British  General 
O’Hara,  who  later  surrendered  Corn¬ 
wallis’s  sword  at  Yorktown.  The 
third  of  the  historic  taverns  was 
Armistead’s,  better  known  later  as 
Powell’s  Tavern.  General  Washing¬ 
ton  is  said  to  have  spent  the  night 
here,  and  it  is  probable  that  it  was 
here  that  the  banquet  to  Aaron  Burr 
was  given  in  1805.  Burr  had  killed 
Hamilton  and  was  far  from  popular 
at  the  time,  and  this  public  banquet 
in  his  honor  seems  strange.  Probably 
it  was  arranged  by  the  effort  and  in¬ 
fluence  of  Burk,  who  had  been  aided 
by  Burr  in  his  escape  from  the  wrath 
of  President  Adams  at  Boston. 

As  Burk  was  a  frequenter  of  Pow¬ 
ell’s  Tavern,  the  Burr  banquet  prob¬ 
ably  occurred  there.  In  this  connec¬ 
tion,  it  may  be  added  that  a  Peters¬ 
burg  lawyer,  a  famous  wit,  who  was 
popular  as  “Jack”  Baker,  was  one 
of  the  counsel  of  Aaron  Burr  in  his 
trial  at  Richmond  on  the  charge  of 
treason  on  account  of  the  projects 
undertaken  during  this  trip  to  the 
south. 

The  last  of  the  four  famous  tav¬ 
erns  was  Niblo’s  Tavern  on  Boiling- 
brook  street.  Here  it  was  that  the 
Lafayette  banquet  was  given  in  1824 
and  in  1828  the  tavern  was  replaced 
by  Niblo’s  Hotel,  a  sixty-five  thous¬ 
and  dollar  structure  still  standing, 
which  was  built  by  William  Niblo, 
afterward  proprietor  of  Niblo’s  Gar¬ 
den  in  New  York. 

Other  Taverns 

Of  secondary  interest  were  several 
other  taverns.  Dodson’s  Tavern  on 
High  street  is  memorable  for  the  fact 
that  here  Theodosia  Burr  made  fa¬ 
mous  cakes  during  her  stay  there 
with  her  father.  Brewer’s  Tavern 
stood  on  the  southeast  corner  of  Syca¬ 
more  and  Bollingbrook  streets,  and 
on  Lombard  street  was  the  Double  Inn, 
just  off  Sycamore,  The  Virginia  Inn 
stood  on  a  cross  street  between  Lom¬ 
bard  and  Bollingbrook.  There  was  also 
Worsham’s  Tavern  on  Old  street,  af- 


terward  the  home  of  J.  B.  Edge,  whose 
bell  gave  the  first  alarm  of  the  fire 
of  1826;  and  Weeks’  Tavern  on  Syca¬ 
more  street,  where  Bowman’s  stores 
now  stand.  This  tavern  was  a  con¬ 
venient  stopping  place  for  the  coun¬ 
try  people  coming  into  the  city 
through  Week’s  Cut,  now  Wythe 
street.  It  was  at  Hannon’s  Tavern 
on  Bank  street  in  1825  that  the  foun¬ 
dations  of  the  Mechanics’  Associa¬ 
tion  were  laid. 

Third  street  was  the  thoroughfare 
in  the  olden  days  and  Jack  McCray’s 
eating  house  stood  on  the  comer  of 
Bollingbrook  and  Second,  just  oppo¬ 
site  the  present  Stratford.  But  fur¬ 
ther  down  Bollingbrook  stood  the 
inn  of  Petersburg  that  gives  a  real 
eighteenth-century  aroma  to  local 
history.  This  was  the  Coffee  House 
of  Zip  Roberts  that  stood  behind  old 
Phoenix  Hall  and  gave  to  the  cross 
street  from  Bollingbrook  to  the  river 
the  name  of  Coffeehouse  Lane. 

The  Race  Courses 

The  people  of  the  city  seem  to  have 
been  a  gay  and  worldly  folk  much 
given  to  pleasure,  with  two  theatres, 
two  parks,  a  racecourse,  and  only  one 
poor  Methodist  church  in  1799.  The 
first  racecourse  seems  to  have  been  in 
Gill  Field,  and  there  is  an  interesting 
record  of  a  race  there  when  the  fam¬ 
ous  horse  Brenner  went  to  pieces. 
Two  other  racecourses  were  estab¬ 
lished  by  the  man  from  whom  Bate’s 
Spring  derives  its  name.  Richard 
Bates  was  a  contractor  who  busied 
himself  with  the  river  improvement 
until  the  funds  were  exhausted.  Then 
he  ran  a  lottery  and  later  engaged  in 
the  mill  business.  Failing  in  these 
things,  he  leased  Poplar  Lawn  and 
established  there  the  second  Peters¬ 
burg  racecourse.  Still  later  he  estab¬ 
lished  the  third  and  most  famous  of 
them  all,  the  Newmarket  racecourse, 
which  was  known  throughout  America 
and  where  many  great  races  took 
place. 

The  Theatres 

The  present  Academy  of  Music  is 
the  fourth  theatre  in  the  history  of  the 
city.  Queerly  enough,  the  first  definite 
mention  of  the  first  theatre  seems  to 
be  the  account  of  the  Methodist  meet¬ 
ings  in  the  Old  Theatre  on  Old  street, 
near  Murray’s  Mill.  The  account  is 
still  extant  of  the  evangelistic  meet¬ 


ings  of  Williams,  McRoberts  and  Jar- 
ratt  in  this  Old  Theatre  in  1773. 
They  preached  with  fervor  to  large 
congregations,  but  their  meetings 
were  interrupted  by  the  bursting  in  of 
doors,  the  throwing  of  squibs,  and 
the  deluging  with  water  from  a  fire 
hose.  The  second  theatre  was  a  poor 
affair,  a  small  wooden  building  that 
stood  on  Fifth  street,  behind  the  old 
Dunlop  place,  near  the  school  of  Par¬ 
son  Syme.  Here  the  Petersburg 
Amateur  Thespians,  in  1803,  acted 
Burk’s  play  of  Bethlem  Gabor,  and 
here  the  actor  Placide  and  his  com¬ 
pany  are  known  to  have  acted  in  the 
same  year,  when  they  gave  the  School 
for  Scandal  at  a  benefit  performance. 
A  second  play  written  for  the  Peters¬ 
burg  Thespians  was  Nolens  Volens,  or 
The  Biter  Bit,  by  Everard  Hill  of 
Blandford.  The  Thespians  were  the 
best  young  men  of  the  day,  John  Mon¬ 
ro  Banister,  Townsend  Stith,  Roger 
Atkinson  Jones,  Thomas  Bolling  Rob¬ 
ertson,  Benjamin  Curtis,  Richard  N. 
Thweatt,  Edwards,  Stainback,  and 
others.  Among  them  was  the  Peters¬ 
burg  poet,  John  McCreery,  who  wrote 
The  American  Star,  the  rival  of  The 
Star  Spangled  Banner,  and  who  also 
wrote  with  Burk  the  songs  that  are 
said  to  have  given  Moore  the  idea  of 
the  Irish  Melodies. 

The  great  playhouse  of  the  city, 
however,  was  the  Petersburg  Theatre 
built  probably  about  1815  or  1820 
on  the  northwest  corner  of  Bolling¬ 
brook  and  Fifth  streets.  This  thea¬ 
tre  was  a  copy  of  Covent  Garden 
Theatre  in  London,  with  a  commodi¬ 
ous  stage,  a  large  pit,  a  semi-circle 
of  stalls,  and  two  galleries.  Junius 
Brutus  Booth  is  said  to  have  played 
here  his  second  engagement  in 
America,  his  first  engagement,  having- 
been  in  the  Marshall  Theatre  in  Rich¬ 
mond.  It  was  due  to  the  money  and 
efforts  of  a  Britisher  named  Caldwell 
that  this  playhouse  was  built  in  such 
handsome  style.  Mr.  Caldwell  was 
a  successful  merchant  of  the  city,  who 
owned  and  named  the  estate  at  the 
head  of  Sycamore  street  still  called 
Mount  Erin.  Most  of  the  famous 
actors  of  the  second  quarter  of  the 
century  played  here,  and  this  is  the 
theatre  so  often  mentioned  in  the  an¬ 
nals  of  the  American  stage.  It  was 
burned  in  1849,  however,  and  there 
are  many  interesting  facts  connected 
with  the  hall  that  succeeded  it. 

The  LaFayette  Ball  was  given  in 
this  third  Petersburg  theatre.  The  pit 


was  floored  over,  the  stage  was  hung  turn  from  his  Arctic  expedition,  gave 
with  pink  and  roofed  with  blue,  with  a  a  great  lecture  and  panorama  and  ex¬ 
palace  scene  at  the  end.  The  top  tier  hibited  his  Eskimo  dogs.  The  third 
of  boxes  was  filled  with  evergreens,  hall  was  Library  Hall,  now  the  of- 
reaching  to  the  vaulted  roof.  The  two  flees  of  the  Electric  company,  and  this 
lower  tiers  of  boxes  were  reserved  for  was  used  for  many  great  lectures  and 
the  gentlemen  until  LaFayette  had  concerts.  It  was  either  here  or  at 
made  the  circle  of  the  ladies  in  the  Phoenix  Hall  that  Thackeray  gave  his 
rotunda,  when  he  retired  to  his  seat  of  lecture  on  the  Four  Georges.  Here 
honor  and  ten  cotillion  sets  were  were  also  given  famous  local  events 
danced  at  once.  This  was  after  the  such  as  the  Kirmess  of  Mischianza 
banquet  in  Niblo’s  Long  Room.  and  the  Congress  of  Nations. 


The  Halls 

Phoenix  Hall,  like  a  phoenix  from 
the  ashes,  rose  on  the  site  of  the 
famous  theatre.  This  is  the  first  of 
three  memorable  halls  of  Petersburg. 
As  religion  advanced,  the  theatre  de¬ 
clined,  and  these  three  halls  played 
a  notable  part  in  the  lecture  or  lyceum 
period  that  followed.  The  democratic 
convention  of  1858  met  in  Phoenix 
Hall  to  nominate  John  Letcher,  the 
war  governor  of  Virginia.  There  is 
mention  of  a  lecture  and  panorama 
of  the  Crimean  war  in  the  following 
year,  and  here  Blind  Tom  played  in 
the  first  year  of  the  Civil  war.  Phoenix 
Hall  was  burned  in  1866.  It  was  here 
that  the  actor,  Tyrone  Power  gave  the 
plays  that  made  him  such  a  favorite 
in  the  city.  He  came  frequently;  and 
it  is  to  his  pen — or  pencil — -that  most 
people  attribute  the  famous  lines  on 
Old  Blandford  Church.  Dr.  J.  H.  Clai¬ 
borne,  however,  in  his  “Seventy-five 
Years  in  Old  Virginia,”  gives  facts 
that  lend  color  to  the  belief  that  they 
were  written  by  Miss  Henning,  a 
daughter  of  Chief-Justice  Henning, 
who  was  afterwards  Mrs.  Schermer- 
horn. 

Thus  in  Phoenix  Hall,  both  before 
and  during  the  war,  occurred  many  no¬ 
table  affairs.  Here  Stephen  A.  Doug¬ 
las,  the  “Little  Giant,”  spoke  about 
1860,  and  William  L,  Yancey  of  Ala¬ 
bama  also  made  a  famous  political 
speech.  On  April  2nd,  1864,  just  one 
year  before  the  evacuation  of  the  city, 
Miss  Estelle’s  Dramatic  Company 
played  here  “The  Carpenter  of  Rouen,” 
followed  by  a  fascinating  danseuse — 
admission,  three  dollars.  At  this  time 
the  stock  of  the  Bank  of  the  City  of 
Petersburg  was  selling  at  two  hundred 
dollars. 

The  second  of  the  memorable  halls 
was  the  Mechanics’  Hall  at  the  cor¬ 
ner  of  Sycamore  and  Tabb  street, 
built  1839.  Here  Dr.  Kane,  on  his  re- 


Old  Hotels 

As  the  halls  succeeded  the  thea¬ 
tres,  so  the  hotels  succeeded  the  tav¬ 
erns  and  inns.  Niblo’s  hotel,  now  the 
Stratford,  was  for  many  years  nota¬ 
ble  as  the  Bollingbrook,  where  many 
of  the  prominent  men  of  the  second 
quarter  of  the  century  were  guests, 
and  where  almost  all  of  the  southern 
leaders  were  familiar  figures  during 
the  siege  of  Petersburg.  The  Fourth 
of  July  oration  was  often  delivered 
from  the  balcony  of  this  hotel,  in 
the  period  after  the  popularity  of 
Hector’s  Spring  and  before  the  Pop¬ 
lar  Lawn  was  used  for  this  purpose. 

One  of  the  most  dramatic  incidents 
in  the  history  of  Petersburg  took 
place  just  at  the  comer  where  this 
hotel  stands.  Here  was  erected  the 
only  Secession  Pole  ever  raised  in 
Petersburg,  bearing  the  Secession 
flag,  called  the  Bonnie  Blue  Flag,  a 
blue  flag  with  a  single  white  star. 
That  night  a  crowd  of  one  hundred 
men  pulled  down  the  pole  and  de¬ 
stroyed  the  flag,  one  man  being  killed 
in  the  melee.  For  Petersburg  was  a 
strong  Union  city,  sending  Union 
delegates  to  the  Virginia  convention, 
whose  votes  were  not  cast  for  seces¬ 
sion  until  President  Lincoln  published 
his  call  for  troops. 

Some  say  that  this  Secession  Pole 
was  further  down  Bollingbrook  Street, 
at  the  Library  Hall  comer,  but  all 
agree  it  was  within  a  block  or  two  of 
the  Hotel. 

An  interesting  war  time  story  is 
told  in  connection  with  the  Long- 
street  banquet  given  in  Bollingbrook 
hotel  during  the  siege.  A  gallant  Pe¬ 
tersburg  private,  fond  of  fighting  and 
of  good  cheer  but  impatient  of  the 
routine  of  camp,  had  that  day  “run 
the  block”  and  come  into  the  city. 
At  the  banquet,  this  prince  of  good 
fellows  was  seated  at  the  right  hand 
of  General  Longstreet  and  opposite 
his  corps  commander,  General  A. 

12 


P.  Hill.  During*  the  dinner,  a  detail 
of  soldiers  appeared  at  the  door,  sent 
to  arrest  the  private,  and  he  was  sav¬ 
ed  only  by  the  prompt  action  of  Gen¬ 
eral  Hill,  either  by  writing  a  pass  for 
him,  as  some  say,  or  by  making  him 
a  member  of  his  staff  on  the  spot,  as 
others  claim.  This  was  the  well- 
known  “Dick”  May,  of  the  same  fam¬ 
ily  as  the  John  May  who  ventured 
with  Johnson  among  the  Indians  in 
1790. 

Powell’s  Hotel  on  Sycamore  street 
succeeded  Powell’s  Tavern  in  1843,  and 
was  a  popular  resort  until  it  was 
destroyed  by  fire.  It  was  succeeded 
in  turn  by  the  great  Iron  Front  build¬ 
ing,  where  provisions  were  contri¬ 
buted  for  the  soldiers  during  the  war, 
by  the  Christian  Association  Build¬ 
ings,  and  by  the  present  stores.  So 
often  has  this  area  been  burned  over 
in  the  last  half-century. 

Of  like  local  interest  with  these 
hotels  and  of  about  the  same  date 
was  Jarratt’s  Hotel,  built  on  the  site 
of  Moss’s  Tavern,  where  the  A.  C.  L. 
upper  depot  now  stands.  Here  was 
the  terminus  of  the  old  Petersburg 
railroad,  chartered  in  1830,  one  of 
the  first  railroads  in  the  country,  and 
for  many  years  this  was  a  famous 
hostelry.  Alexander  H.  Stephens,  as 
a  congressman  before  the  war,  used 
to  stop  here  on  his  way  to  and  from 
Washington,  and  here  too  President 
Davis  stopped  on  his  way  to  Rich¬ 
mond  to  take  charge  of  the  Confed¬ 
erate  government  there.  All  of  these 
old  hotels  did  a  flourishing  business, 
especially  for  several  decades  before 
the  civil  war.  Petersburg  was  the 
center  of  a  most  prosperous  section, 
and  the  planters  for  miles  around 
would  come  to  the  city  and  spend  sev¬ 
eral  weeks  during  the  season.  For 
the  city  had  a  season  then,  with  all 
the  diversions  for  which  the  state  has 
been  famous.  As  mentioned  above, 
one  of  the  handsome  theatres  of  the 
south  was  here,  and  even  in  the  decade 
before  the  war,  when  there  were  only 
the  three  halls,  there  was  no  lack  of 
entertainments  both  amusing  and  in¬ 
structive.  Phoenix  hall  had  a  regular 
stock  company,  and  only  the  theatrical 
stars  were  imported  to  take  the  prin¬ 
cipal  roles.  All  these  attractions 
added  to  the  patronage  of  the  hotels. 

A  Famous  Park 

The  oldest  of  the  parks  in  Petersburg 
was  Poplar  Lawn,  which  keeps  its  beau¬ 


ty  but  not  the  charm  of  its  old  name  as 
Central  Park.  Instead  of  the  beautiful 
grove  of  today,  however,  it  was  former¬ 
ly  a  perfect  stretch  of  greensward,  a 
lawn  indeed. 

On  Poplar  Lawn  the  Petersburg  Vol¬ 
unteers  were  encamped  in  1812  before 
they  set  out  for  the  Canadian  border, 
and  on  October  21st,  1812,  Benjamin 
Watkins  Leigh  here  presented  them  with 
a  flag  from  the  ladies  of  the  city.  To 
Poplar  Lawn  in  1824  came  LaFayette 
and  his  friends  from  the  banquet  at  Nib- 
lo’s  Tavern  to  hear  speeches  and  to  lis¬ 
ten  to  the  songs  of  four  hundred  school 
children  from  Anderson  school.  It  was 
either  here  or  at  Centre  Hill  that  Judge 
James  H.  Gholson  on  Jan.  2nd,  1847,  on 
the  part  of  the  ladies  of  the  city,  present¬ 
ed  a  flag  to  Captain  F.  H.  Archer’s  com¬ 
pany  on  the  eve  of  their  departure  for 
the  Mexican  war,  and  the  members  of 
the  Petersburg  bar  presented  a  sword 
to  Captain  Archer  himself. 

The  city  bought  the  Lawn  for  $15,000 
in  1844,  and  the  Fourth  of  July  parades 
began  and  ended  here.  In  fact,  all  the 
military  companies  of  the  city  used  to 
encamp  on  Poplar  Lawn  on  the  evening 
of  the  third,  and  the  parade  of  the  Fourth 
was  followed  by  the  reading  of  the  Decla¬ 
ration  of  Independence  and  an  oration 
by  some  distinguished  citizen.  The 
Lawn  was  not  only  a  drilling-ground 
for  soldiers,  but  also  an  open-air  forum, 
where  in  the  old  days  such  orators  as 
Henry  Clay  addressed  the  people. 

The  most  dramatic  day  in  the  history 
of  Poplar  Lawn  was  the  Ninteenth  of 
April,  1861,  immediately  after  the  se¬ 
cession  of  Virginia,  when  six  fully  equipped 
companies  were  enlisted  into  the  service 
of  the  Confederacy,  leaving  Poplar  Lawn 
the  next  morning  for  the  defense  of  Nor¬ 
folk. 

A  true  story  of  Poplar  Lawn  shows  the 
straits  to  which  the  city  was  reduced 
during  the  siege.  As  the  Federal  shells 
were  falling  around  the  hospital  on  the 
Lawn,  it  was  necessary  to  hoist  a  hos¬ 
pital  flag  there.  No  such  flag  of  truce 
could  be  found  in  the  city,  and  for  lack 
of  any  other  yellow  cloth,  the  yellow 
silk  petticoat  of  a  patriotic  lady  of  the 
city  was  hoisted  on  the  hospital  pole. 
This  petticoat  is  still  preserved. 

West  End  Park,  formerly  the  Fair 
Grounds,  is  worthy  of  mention  as  the 
place  where  the  Federal  soldiers  were 
encamped  during  Reconstruction  times. 
Not  only  both  the  parks  and  other  open 
spaces,  but  also  almost  all  the  large 
buildings,  especially  the  tobacco  fact¬ 
ories  and  warehouses,  were  used  during 
the  siege  either  as  hospitals  or  as  prisons. 

13 


Historic  Schools 

Four  of  the  schools  of  Petersburg  are 
closely  connected  with  its  history,  and 
three  of  them  are  part  of  the  story  of  the 
siege  of  Petersburg.  Earliest  of  these  is 
“The  Academy’  ’  incorporated  in  1794 
and  continued  until  1835,  when  all  its 
property  was  transferred  to  Anderson 
Seminary,  named  in  memory  of  the 
Scotchman  who  left  a  bequest  in  1819 
for  the  education  of  the  poor  of  the  city. 
The  Academy  was  succeeded  by  the 
Petersburg  Classical  Academy,  which 
was  taught  by  Principal  Saunders  in  the 
building  since  used  as  the  public  high 
school  on  Union  street. 

The  first  academy  is  memorable  both 
for  its  early  origin  and  also  for  a  famous 
teacher.  In  the  early  years  of  the  last 
century,  about  1808,  John  Davis,  an  Eng¬ 
lishman,  was  a  teacher  here.  He  wrote 
a  novel  about  Pocahontas  that  was  ridi¬ 
culed  by  the  Edinburgh  Review  in  1806, 
and  also  a  volume  of  Travels  in  America 
that  was  praised  by  the  New  York  In¬ 
dependent  in  1910,  when  it  was  honored 
with  a  reprint  by  Holt. 

The  Lancaterian  School 

New  Year’s  Day,  1821,  marked  a  new 
era  in  education  in  Petersburg,  for  then 
the  first  germ  idea  of  general  education 
arrived  from  over  seas  and  found  fertile 
soil  and  favoring  conditions  in  this  city. 
The  “plan  of  edu«ation  for  poor  children” 
reported  on  the  memorable  day  and 
adopted  by  the  Common  Hall  a  month 
later,  forms  a  striking  landmark  in  the 
history  of  local  education,  and  marks 
the  beginning  of  the  Anderson  Seminary. 

David  Anderson,  a  native  Scotland, 
but  long  a  member  of  the  Common  Hall 
and  Chamberlain  of  the  City  of  Peters¬ 
burg,  left  a  bequest  of  some  ten  thousand 
dollars  for  the  education  of  the  poor 
children  in  “spelling,  reading,  writing 
and  arithmetic.”  A  special  committee  of 
three  reported  to  the  Common  Hall,  Jan¬ 
uary  first,  1821,  that  seventy  or  eighty 
children  were  entitled  to  this  training 
under  the  will,  that  twenty  dollars  per 
pupil  was  the  price  of  such  tuition,  and 
that  eight  dollars  per  pupil  was  the  price 
of  books  and  “stationary.”  Thus  the  be¬ 
quest  of  six  hundred  dollars  per  annum 
seemed  insufficient. 

“But  on  the  Lancasterian  plan,”  the 
report  continues,  “it  is  understood  and 
believed  that  one  Master  can  attend 
an  hundred  children,  in  the  branches  pro¬ 
posed;  and  carry  them  forward  as  rapidly 
and  perhaps  more  so,  than  in  the  ordinary 
way  of  teaching,  thus  making  the  fund 
equal  to  four  times  its  amount  in  the  com¬ 


mon  way.  This  plan  has  been  adopted 
in  most  of  our  cities  and  large  towns  and 
high  encomiums  have  frequently  been 
passed  upon  it  throughout  Europe.” 

This  Lancasterian  Plan  was  the  method 
of  teaching  evolved  by  Joseph  Lancaster, 
the  new  light  in  education  in  the  opening 
of  the  nineteeth  century,  the  Montessori 
of  a  hundred  years  ago.  Lancaster’s 
efforts  to  give  the  poor  the  rudiments 
of  instruction  without  fee  had  brought  a 
thousand  children  to  his  Borough  Road 
school  in  London,  founded  1798,  and  had 
aroused  public  interest  in  his  system.  The 
Edinburgh  Review  called  his  method 
“a  beautiful  and  inestimable  discovery, 
a  plan  now  brought  very  near  to  perfec¬ 
tion.”  George  III  encouraged  Lancast¬ 
er,  and  in  1808  the  Royal  Lancasterian 
Institution  was  founded  in  England.  But 
Lancaster  quarreled  with  his  trustees, 
set  up  his  private  school  at  Tooting,  be¬ 
came  bankrupt,  and  in  1818  emigrated  to 
America.  Here  he  had  a  warm  reception, 
giving  several  courses  of  lectures  in  New 
York  and  elsewhere,  and  began  to  estab¬ 
lish  his  system  of  schools.  Thus  Ander¬ 
son’s  bequest  to  the  poor  children  of  Pet¬ 
ersburg  came  at  the  very  time  when 
Lancaster’s  system  was  being  taught  in 
America  by  Lancaster  himself. 

This  new  system,  by  which  Lancaster 
claimed  that  it  was  possible  “to  teach 
ten  thousand  children  to  read  fluently  in 
from  three  weeks  to  three  months,”  was 
one  of  the  two  “monitorial”  methods  of 
instruction  of  that  day.  Bell  and  Lan¬ 
caster  were  the  two  “rival  inventors”  of 
this  “mutual”  method,  which  really 
came  from  the  East.  Finally  Bell’s  sys¬ 
tem  was  generally  adopted  in  England 
by  the  Church  of  England,  while  Lan¬ 
caster’s  found  favor  with  the  Noncon¬ 
formists.  The  three  main  features  of 
Lancaster’s  plan  were  the  use  of  older 
scholars  as  “monitors”  or  assistant  teach¬ 
ers,  the  use  of  a  special  system  of  drill 
and  the  use  of  simple  material  ap¬ 
pliances — “a  few  little  leaves  torn  out  of 
spelling-books  and  pasted  on  boards, 
some  slates,  and  a  desk  spread  with  sand 
on  which  the  children  wrote  with  their 
fiingers.”  There  are  extant  interesting 
pictures  of  the  Lancasterian  school-room 
with  the  monitors  at  regular  intervals 
along  the  walls,  each  facing  a  semi-circle 
of  young  pupils,  and  thanks  to  David 
Anderson,  such  a  school  was  founded  in 
Petersburg  in  1821. 

Anderson  Seminary 

The  very  details  of  the  founding  of 
Anderson  Seminary,  give  a  bright  touch 
of  local  color.  The  six  hundred  dollar  in¬ 
come  of  the  Anderson  Fund  was  combined 


14 


with  the  two  hundred  dollar  income  of  the 
Literary  Fund,  total  eight  hundred,  and 
the  Common  Hall,  1821,  appointed  twelve 
trustees,  who  were  allowed  to  spend  for 
the  first  year  six  hundred  and  forty  dol¬ 
lars  for  house  and  a  teacher  “who  will 
qualify  himself  to  teach  on  this  Lancast- 
erian  plan”  and  one  hundred  and  sixty  for 
“books,  forms,  lessons,  and  stationery 
for  seventy  scholars.”  The  teacher, 
however,  was  to  reserve  for  himself  the 
privilege  of  taking  other  pupils  for  pay. 
The  great  success  of  the  plan  is  shown  by 
the  fact  that  soon  afterward  (in  1824), 
four  hundred  pupils  of  the  school  gathered 
on  Poplar  Lawn  to  sing  patriotic  songs 
on  the  occasion  of  the  visit  of  General 
LaFayette,  and  by  the  further  fact  that 
about  a  decade  later  the  Petersburg  Aca¬ 
demy,  founded  in  1794,  was  absorbed  by 
the  Anderson  Seminary,  as  already 
stated.  Thus  Anderson  Seminary,  nearly 
a  century  old,  is  the  link  connecting 
the  local  public  school  system  of  to-day 
with  the  beginnings  of  the  movement 
for  general  education  in  America.  It  is 
most  fitting  that  the  one  monument 
erected  in  Blandford  churchyard  by  the 
“Corporation  of  Petersburg,”  is  “Sacred 
to  the  Memory  of  David  Anderson,  a 
Benefactor  and  a  Friend  of  Man.” 

Schools  for  Boys 

Two  private  schools  for  boys  of  the 
second  half  of  the  last  century  have  an 
especial  interest  to  the  student  of  local 
history.  On  Sycamore  street  just  above 
Central  park  is  the  one-story  building 
that  was  the  schoolhouse  of  Mr.  George 
E.  Christian  during  the  Civil  War.  Here 
on  fateful  Ninth  of  June,  1864,  the  boys 
of  Christian’s  school  were  preparing 
their  French  lessons,  not  knowing  that 
their  teacher,  Prof.  Staubly,  lay  dead 
on  the  Rives  farm,  two  miles  away,  where 
he  had  aided  in  the  brave  defence  that 
delayed  General  Kautz  and  saved  the 
city  for  nearly  a  year. 

Directly  opposite  the  Park  on  the  same 
street,  at  the  corner  of  Fillmore,  is  the 
vacant  lot  where  stood  after  the  war  the 
wooden  building  of  McCabe’s  University 
School.  This  building  was  afterwards 
bought  by  the  Christian  church  and  re¬ 
moved  to  Washington  street,  where  it 
stands  today  opposite  Pine  street.  The 
University  School  was  known  through¬ 
out  the  land  for  a  third  of  a  century. 
Although  is  was  established  after  the 
war,  it  is  part  of  the  war  history  of  the 
city  for  the  reason  that  its  distinguished 
head-master  was  the  gallant  young  ad¬ 
jutant  of  Pegram’s  Battery  and  later 
became  the  historian  of  the  Battle  of 
the  Crater  in  his  eloquent  address  before 
the  Army  of  Northern  Virginia. 


Southern  College 

The  third  school  that  is  a  part  of  the 
war  record  of  the  city  is  the  Southern 
Junior  College,  whose  buildings  stand 
on  Sycamore  Street,  diagonally  across 
from  Central  Park.  This  institution  is 
historic  through  the  fact  that  it  was  char¬ 
tered  by  the  Confederate  legislature  and 
carried  on  its  work  of  training  young 
women  during  the  siege  of  the  city. 

On  the  same  memorable  ninth  of  June 
1864,  the  founder  and  president  of  the 
college,  Williams  T.  Davis,  like  Prof. 
Staubly,  was  in  Archer’s  command  in  the 
Rives  farm  fight  in  defence  of  the  city, 
while  three  of  his  sons  were  in  other  com¬ 
mands.  It  was  probably  because  of  his 
absence  that  the  college  girls  were  group¬ 
ed  on  the  front  piazza  on  this  June  day. 
At  any  rate,  it  is  a  fact  that  as  Graham’s 
battery  of  four  guns  came  dashing  and 
swaying  up  Sycamore  Street,  with  the 
men  on  the  caissons  clinging  for  life  as 
they  rushed  to  drive  back  Kautz’s  ad¬ 
vance  up  the  New  Road,  they  were  cheer¬ 
ed  by  the  college  girls  with  a  spirit  and 
strength  that  made  the  cheer  audible 
above  the  rumble  of  the  cannon.  On  went 
the  guns,  the  two  brass  howitzers  turning 
into  the  New  Road  and  the  two  rifled 
guns  going  into  position  on  the  crest  of  the 
Delectable  Heights  in  time  to  repel  the 
attack. 

It  is  said  that  in  this  attack  Graham’s 
Battery  fired  thirty-nine  rounds  without 
sponging. 

A  Soldier’s  Dairy 

In  “Confederate  War  Talks,”  a  member 
of  Graham’s  Battery  gives  the  following 
account  of  this  episode:  “As  our  battery 
galloped  up  Sycamore  street,  the  ladies 
waved  their  handkerchiefs  and  the  boys 
in  the  battery  responded  with  cheers. 
The  Southern  Female  College  building 
was  filled  with  ladies,  who  waved  hand¬ 
kerchiefs  while  we  cheered,  and  just  here 
a  pigeon,  on  its  wild  fight  in  the  air,  dart¬ 
ed  down  towards  the  moving  battery,  see- 
ing  which  several  of  the  old  veterans  gently 
ducked  their  heads,  thinking  the  bird  a 
ball  from  one  of  enemy’s  guns,  as  we 
could  hear  the  firing  in  the  distance  over 
the  hills.” 

Southern  College  Again 

Through  a  long  part  of  the  siege,  the 
work  of  the  college  was  carried  on  daily, 
the  hours  of  lecture  being  arranged  so 
girls  might  not  go  to  and  fro  during  the 
fixed  hours  of  bombardment.  The  bomb¬ 
proof  cellar  is  still  to  be  seen  to  which 
the  resident  students  retired  during  the 


shelling.  The  spot  in  the  grounds  is  still 
shown  where  the  shell  fell  during  the 
siege,  and  the  other  spot  where  the  silver 
was  buried  in  anticipation  of  the  capture 
of  the  city.  Finally  the  danger  became 
so  great  that  the  school  was  removed  to 
Danville,  where  it  was  located  when  the 
last  meeting  of  the  Confederate  cabinet 
was  held  there.  Immediately  after  the 
war,  the  college  was  again  established 
in  its  old  home  in  Petersburg. 

A  College  Story 

Many  interesting  stories  of  war  times 
are  told  about  the  College.  One  of  the 
most  amusing  is  the  account  of  the  wedd¬ 
ing-dinner  on  the  occasion  of  the  marriage 
of  the  president’s  eldest  daughter  to  a 
Confederate  Major  during  the  siege  of 
Petersburg.  In  spite  of  the  long  siege,  a 
banquet  was  spread  and  all  the  guests 
were  seated,  when  Anderson,  the  butler, 
was  called  out  to  answer  a  loud  riging  of 
the  door-bell. 

Some  of  the  gay  and  hungry  young 
blades  of  a  New  Orleans  Company, 
brothers-in-arms  to  the  Major  and  friends 
of  the  family,  having  heard  the  news  of 
the  wedding  had  left  the  lines  and  “run 
the  block,”  and  came  en  masse  to  the 
feast.  So  stately  old  Anderson  made 
the  tragic  announcement:  “Marse  Will¬ 
iams,  de  Wash-nun  Artillery  in  de  par¬ 
lor.” 

A  Ninth  of  June  Story 

The  same  Anderson  was  on  the  lines 
with  President  Wms.  T.  Davis  on  the 
Ninth  of  June.  It  is  not  clear  whether 
he  went  as  the  body  servant  that  some¬ 
times  accompanied  even  the  private 
soldier,  or  whether  he  was  sent  to  bear 
some  message  or  food.  At  any  rate,  as 
the  afternoon  wore  on  and  sounds  of 
fighting  were  borne  to  the  anxious  wife, 
she  saw  Anderson  approaching  without 
his  master.  Full  of  dread,  she  cried: 
“Anderson,  what  have  you  done  with 
Mr.  Davis?  Why  have  you  left  him?” 
“Law,  Miss  Carrie,”  was  the  reply,  “de 
bullets  was  flyin’  en  Marse  Williams  say 
dat  warn’t  no  place  for  a  nigger,  en  he 
sont  me  home.” 

An  Intensive  Study 

An  intensive  study  of  any  spot  in 
Petersburg  is  sure  to  reveal  interesting 
facts.  As  an  illustration  of  this,  the 
history  of  the  grounds  and  buildings  of 
Southern  College  may  be  traced. 

This  site  was  not  included  in  the  origi¬ 
nal  1748  charter  of  Abraham  Jones,  for 
the  reason  that  it  was  in  “Ravenscroft,” 
the  settlement  embraced  within  the  tri¬ 
angle  formed  to-day  by  Halifax,  Syca¬ 
more  and  Shore  Streets. 


The  Petersburg  Poorhouse 

Thus  it  was  not  until  the  second  char¬ 
ter  of  1748  that  this  site  became  part  of 
Petersburg,  and  it  was  later  chosen  as 
the  location  for  the  poorhouse.  It  was 
because  of  this  fact  that  Tulip  Lane  on 
the  east  of  Sycamore  Street  could  not 
keep  a  straight  course,  as  the  town 
authorities  would  not  condemn  a  right 
of  way  through  their  own  poorhouse, 
but  deflected  the  “Lane”  to  one  side, 
forming  the  present  College  Place.  This 
early  use  of  this  site  for  a  poorhouse  has 
caused  many  a  merry  jest  about  rever¬ 
sion  to  original  use,  in  view  of  the  fact 
that  the  teaching  profession  is  an  im¬ 
pecunious  one. 

Magnate’s  Home  and  College 

About  a  third  of  a  century  later,  how¬ 
ever,  Mr.  Henry  D.  Bird,  first  an  en¬ 
gineer  of  construction  and  later  president 
of  the  Petersburg  Railroad,  bought  the 
property  and  erected  on  it  one  of  the 
handsome  homes  of  the  city.  This  is 
now  the  nucleus  of  the  Main  building  of 
Southern  College. 

In  the  fifties,  the  part  of  the  property 
on  the  corner  of  College  Place  was  bought 
by  the  Methodists  as  the  site  of  the 
Petersburg  Female  Sollege.  Surprising 
to  relate,  the  building  was  designed  and 
prepared  in  the  North  and  shipped  to 
Petersburg  and  erected  as  an  ideal  Col¬ 
lege  building. 

A  Gradual  Growth 

In  1862,  Mr.  Williams  T.  Davis,  then 
president  of  Petersburg  Female  College, 
bought  the  Henry  D.  Bird  House  in  order 
to  establish  an  independent  college,  char¬ 
tered  in  1863  as  the  Southern  Female  Col¬ 
lege.  In  the  seventies  he  added  the 
lecture-room  building.  On  his  death  in 
1888,  his  son  succeeded  him  and  in  the 
nineties  he  added  to  the  original  build¬ 
ings.  Meantime  the  Petersburg  Female 
College  had  passed,  and  the  property 
was  used  as  private  residences.  Soon 
after  nineteen  hundred,  however,  it  was 
purchased  for  use  as  part  of  Southern 
College,  and  is  now  the  College  Annex. 

Thus  the  College  site  in  Petersburg 
on  Sycamore  Street  facing  Tulip  Alley 
was  originally  in  “Ravenscroft”  on 
“Walnut  Lane”  facing  “Tulip  Lane,” 
and  since  that  time  it  has  held  a  poor- 
house,  a  railway  magnate’s  house,  two 
rival  schools,  and  the  present  College. 
Equally  striking  details  of  local  history 
may  probably  be  learned  from  any  other 
site  chosen  at  random  in  the  city. 

16 


Historic  Churches 

Several  of  the  churches  of  Petersburg 
should  have  special  mention.  St.  Paul’s 
Episcopal  church,  the  child  of  old  Bris¬ 
tol  Parish  church,  was  first  built  in  1802 
on  the  site  of  the  present  court-house. 
It  was  later  moved  to  Sycamore  Street, 
opposite  Franklin,  and  when  this  church 
was  burned  in  1853,  the  present  edifice 
on  Union  Street  was  built.  The  moving 
from  Blandford  was  in  the  time  of  Parson 
Syme,  to  whom  a  memorial  tablet  should 
be  placed  in  Old  Blandford.  Before  the 
church  of  1802  was  built,  Cameron  and 
Syme  preached  on  alternate  Sundays  in 
the  Blandford  church  and  in  the  Peters¬ 
burg  court-house,  but  to  small  congre¬ 
gations,  as  religion  was  then  at  a  low  ebb 
in  this  section.  It  was  in  this  “new  brick 
church,”  built  1802-6,  that  Burk  deliver¬ 
ed  an  oration  five  weeks  before  his  death. 

On  Union  Street,  where  the  Roper 
warehouse  now  stands,  was  the  most 
famous  historic  church  building  of  Peters¬ 
burg.  This  primacy  was  due  not  only  to 
the  fact  that  this  church  was  the  child  of 
the  first  church  of  any  denomination  in 
Petersburg,  the  old  Methodist  church 
that  stood  perhaps  first  on  Old  and  after¬ 
ward  on  Market  street  at  the  junction  of 
Friend  street,  but  especially  to  the  fact 
that  here  was  held  the  first  General  Con¬ 
ference  of  the  Methodist  Church,  South, 
after  its  separation  from  the  (Northern) 
Methodist  church.  Thus  this  old  build¬ 
ing  was  the  scene  of  the  organization  of 
the  large  body  of  Secessionists  that  still 
maintains  a  separate  existence.  At  this 
conference,  Bishop  Andrews  presided, 
and  there  was  a  dramatic  moment  when 
Bishop  Soule,  the  general  superintendent 
of  the  whole  Methodist  church  of  the 
country,  announced  his  allegiance  to  the 
Southern  branch  of  the  church.  The  con¬ 
gregation  of  this  church  afterward  built 
Washington  street  Methodist  church, 
and  the  Union  street  building  became 
a  negro  church  until  it  was  torn  down. 

The  original  building  of  Tabb  street 
Presbyterian  church  is  now  A.  P.  Hill 
Camp  hall.  A  new  church  was  built 
directly  opposite,  and  when  this  was 
burned,  the  present  edifice  was  built. 
This  church  is  historic  through  memor¬ 
able  sermons  during  the  secession  times 
and  the  building  itself,  though  dignified 
and  beautiful  in  its  combination  of  Clas¬ 
sic  and  Gothic  types  of  architecture, 
drew  a  humorous  reference  from  Max 
O’Rell  on  his  lecture-trip  to  Petersburg. 
In  “A  Frenchman  in  America,”  he  speaks 
of  it  as  a  Greek  temple  with  a  steeple, 
and  compares  it  to  a  Roman  senator  with 
a  toga  and  a  stovepipe  hat.  The  Second 
Presbyterian  church  on  Washington 


street  is  also  historic  through  the  fact 
that  it  was  built  during  the  Civil  War, 
the  tower  of  the  old  church  on  Baltimore 
Row  on  High  street  being  used  during 
the  late  years  of  the  war  as  a  shot  tower. 
Grace  Episcopal  church,  on  the  other 
hand,  having  moved  from  the  brick 
church  on  Old  Street  to  worship  in  the 
basement  of  the  new  church  just  before 
hostilities  began,  was  not  able  to  com¬ 
plete  the  High  street  building  until  1870. 
The  First  Baptist  church  on  Washington 
is  memorable  as  having  been  built  to  re¬ 
place  the  one  struck  by  lightning  and 
burned  in  1865.  The  first  church  of  the 
Baptists  in  the  city  is  now  the  rear  of  the 
Builders’  Supply  Company  building,  and 
the  second  Baptist  church  built  in  the 
city  stood  at  the  corner  of  Market  and 
High  streets. 

The  Public  Buildings 

The  first  courthouse  stood  on  the  site 
of  the  present  clerk’s  office,  and  the  old 
wooden  building  is  still  preserved  across 
the  river  in  Ettrick.  The  handsome 
courthouse  of  today  is  said  to  have  been 
modeled  after  the  designs  of  Sir  Charles 
Christopher  Wren.  It  was  in  the  old 
wooden  courthouse  that  Burk  delivered 
his  oration,  still  extant,  on  the  4th  of 
March,  1803,  to  celebrate  the  election  of 
Jefferson,  but  it  was  in  the  present  court¬ 
house  that  there  were  stirring  events  in 
Reconstruction  times,  when  a  Federal 
officer  reversed  his  decision  in  one  min¬ 
ute,  leaving  the  cit>  on  the  same  night. 

The  Mechanics’  Association  building, 
succeeded  by  the  present  steel  structure, 
has  already  been  mentioned  as  Mechanics 
Hall,  but  it  was  historic  also  through  the 
story  of  the  origin  of  the  Association  it¬ 
self.  It  is  the  one  permanent  result  of 
the  visit  of  LaFayette  in  1824.  The 
mechanics  of  the  town  had  gathered  to 
plan  the  erection  of  a  triumphal  arch  to 
LaFayette,  when  the  news  came  that 
he  would  arrive  the  next  day,  too  soon 
for  their  purpose,  but  the  assembled 
workmen  united  themselves  into  a  guild 
that  is  flourishing  today.  The  Associa¬ 
tion  library  and  museum  deserve  mention 
as  among  the  best  antiquarian  collect¬ 
ions  in  Virginia.  As  a  benevolent  asso¬ 
ciation,  it  must  yield  the  palm  for  early 
historic  birth  to  the  Blandford  Lodge  of 
Masons,  established  in  1757  as  the  third 
lodge  in  America. 

Interesting  sidelights  of  history  are 
given  in  the  records  of  the  Mechanics’ 
Association.  The  election  of  three  min¬ 
isters  as  honorary  members  of  the  Asso¬ 
ciation  in  1826  marks  the  religious  revival. 
These  were  Rev.  Andrew  Syme  of  the 
Episcopal  church,  Rev.  Benj.  H.  Rice  of 


17 


the  Presbyterian  church,  and  Rev.  Min¬ 
ton  Thrift  of  the  Methodist  church,  who 
wrote  in  1845  an  incomplete  history  of 
the  city.  His  estate  on  Sycamore  Street, 
between  Franklin  and  Washington,  was 
known  as  Thrift’s  Garden.  Two  other 
honorary  members  of  the  Association 
should  be  mentioned — John  Niblo,  who 
was  elected  in  1828,  the  year  in  which 
Niblo’s  Hotel  was  built,  and  Elihu 
Burritt,  the  “Learned  Blacksmith,”  who 
was  thus  honored  in  1843,  perhaps  after 
lecturing  here. 

The  Exchange  building  on  Bank  street 
represents  a  futile  effort  made  in  1839  to 
establish  a  regular  produce  exchange 
here.  This  enterprise  lanquished  with  a 
slight  flurry  of  success  in  1858,  until  it 
was  finally  suspended  before  the  war. 
During  the  war,  this  was  the  home  of 
the  Bank  of  the  City  of  Petersburg, 
which  ended  with  the  war.  The  only 
bank  that  lived  through  the  troublous 
time  was  the  Petersburg  Savings  and 
Insurance  Company. 

Two  other  banks  on  this  street  occu¬ 
pied  respectively  the  site  of  the  present 
Academy  building  and  the  same  build¬ 
ing  now  occuiped  by  Cuthbert  Bros.  The 
wide  space  on  the  sidewalk  in  front  of  this 
was  left  for  the  guard  house  that  was  be¬ 
fore  the  bank  in  those  days.  On  Bank 
street  was  also  the  office  of  Dr.  Joseph 
E.  Cox,  who  perished  in  the  great  snow 
of  1857,  hence  called  Cox’s  Snow.  Men¬ 
tion  has  already  been  made  of  the  Lib¬ 
rary  Association  building  on  Boiling- 
brook  street,  which  was  burned  in  1878 
and  afterward  rebuilt.  This  association 
was  chartered  in  1853,  and  its  library 
was  a  very  valuable  one. 

Story  of  the  Streets 

The  history  of  Petersburg  is  written 
in  a  general  way  in  the  names  of  its 
streets,  although  at  first  sight  these 
names  seem  a  hopeless  jumble  of  nature, 
biography,  mythology,  and  the  Bible. 
There  are,  of  course,  the  usual  proprie¬ 
tary  names  of  Bolling,  Jones,  Gill,  Tabb 
and  Shore.  In  regular  order  of  place  and 
time,  however,  four  marked  divisions  of 
streets  may  be  traced,  the  practical,  the 
patriotic,  the  classic,  and  the  Biblical. 

The  early  settlers,  busy  with  practical 
affairs,  gave  to  the  streets  names  that 
were  simple  indicants,  such  as  High  and 
Low,  River  and  Market,  Sycamore  and 
Oak.  As  the  town  spread  southward 
from  the  river  at  the  time  of  the  revolu¬ 
tion  and  afterward,  a  furore  of  patriotism 
seems  to  have  seized  the  inhabitants, 
and  thus  the  next  range  of  streets  includes 
Henry  and  Franklin,  Washington  and 
LaFayette,  Adams  and  Jefferson,  Wythe 


and  Marshall,  Harrison  and  Fillmore, 
Clinton  and  Webster,  with  a  general 
flourish  in  Liberty  street.  Then  as  the 
tide  of  patriotic  feeling  abated  in  the 
wrangle  of  parties  and  sections,  probably 
near  the  middle  of  the  last  century,  the 
list  of  national  names  came  to  an  abrupt 
close. 

However,  as  the  tide  of  population 
still  spread  southward  toward  that  part 
of  the  city  called  by  LaFayette  “The 
Delectable  Heights,”  new  names  had  to 
be  found,  and  probably  some  alumnus  of 
the  old  Petersburg  Academy,  founded 
in  1794,  or  some  new-fleged  graduate  of 
the  University  of  Virginia,  founded  in 
1825,  showed  his  classical  knowledge  by 
suggesting  to  the  ^Petersburg  proprietors 
or  powers  the  names  of  mythology.  Thus 
the  third  range  of  streets  bears  such 
names  as  Mars  and  Apollo,  Mercury  and 
Cupid,  and  other  heathen  gods.  Prob¬ 
ably  the  religious  revival  put  an  end  to 
this  honoring  of  the  heathern  divinities, 
as  the  fourth  range  of  streets,  on  the  very 
Heights,  has  entirely  orthodox  names  in 
St.  Matthew,  St.  Mark,  St.  Luke  and 
St.  John. 

Halifax  street  was  the  road  leading 
out  to  Halifax,  North  Carolina,  but  for 
one  square  it  retains  its  old  name  of  Oak 
street.  One  of  the  quaintest  streets  in 
the  city  has  three  names  in  a  quarter- 
mile  stretch.  This  was  Back  street  in 
the  early  days,  but  it  was  later  given  the 
aristocratic  English  name  of  Lombard, 
as  fashion  moved  over  from  Blandford. 
After  crossing  Sycamore  street,  however, 
it  degenerates  into  business  as  Bank,  and 
rises  into  residential  sections  as  High. 
As  Blandford,  once  a  rival  but  now  a 
suburb,  had  preempted  the  name  of  Main 
street,  the  city  named  its  main  thorough¬ 
fare  Sycamore  street  from  the  two  syca¬ 
mores  that  once  stood  at  the  junction 
with  Old  street.  This  street  was  former¬ 
ly  Sycamore  only  as  far  up  as  Oak  street, 
where  its  name  changed  to  Walnut,  a 
name  fortunately  preserved  in  Walnut 
Hill  across  the  new  viaduct  at  the  head 
of  Sycamore  street.  In  like  manner, 
Phoenix  street  today  preserves  the  name 
of  Old  Phoenix  Hall. 

This  march  of  Sycamore  Street  south¬ 
ward  from  the  River  to  the  Heights 
makes  an  interesting  study  in  old  records. 
At  first  the  name  seems  to  have  a  mere 
foothold  from  the  Old  Market  to  the  foot 
of  the  present  street,  all  Sycamore  being 
then  known  as  Walnut  Lane.  Just  as  the 
westward  march  of  the  English  drove 
back  the  Indians,  however,  so  the  ad¬ 
vance  of  Sycamore  Street  pushed  the 
name  of  Walnut  further  and  further  South. 
In  its  second  phase,  Sycamore  Street  ex¬ 
tended  only  as  far  as  Back  (or  Lombard) 


Street,  later  it  advanced  to  Powell’s 
Tavern,  then  it  extended  up  to  Weeks’s 
Tavern,  and  finally  it  reached  The 
Heights.  Thus  Sycamore  Street,  after 
crawling  two  squares  in  its  infancy,  took 
a  boyish  hop  to  Tabb  Street,  a  youthful 
skip  to  Oak  Street,  and  a  full  man’s  jump 
to  The  Heights. 

The  Blandford  streets  also  deserve 
mention.  Here  too  are  found,  of  course, 
a  few  proprietary  names,  such  as  Burch, 
Mingea,  Poythress,  and  Taylor,  but  the 
two  streets  parallel  with  Main  are  Church 
street  and  Little  Church  street.  It  is 
an  amusing  thought  that  although  these 
devout  names  were  given,  it  was  necces- 
sary  to  hold  a  lottery  to  help  pay  for  the 
building  of  the  old  Blandford  church. 
Main  street,  like  Duke  of  Gloucester 
street  in  Williamsburg,  was  laid  out  in 
princely  style.  It  was  ninety  feet  wide, 
and  at  the  Courthouse  Square  it  broad¬ 
ened  out  one  hundred  feet  on  each  side, 
making  a  generous  square.  There  were 
hospitable  homes  along  these  generous 
streets,  the  old  Haxall  House  marking 
perhaps  the  limit  of  the  fashionable  re¬ 
sidence  section  before  the  exodus  to 
Petersburg  about  1800. 

PART  IV— CIVIL  WAR  HISTORY 

The  Battlefields 

A  quarter  of  a  mile  beyond  Blandford 
is  the  Crater,  the  most  interesting  point 
in  the  line  of  intrenchment  thirty-five 
miles  in  length  which  held  the  hopes  of 
the  Confederacy  in  1864-65.  Petersburg’s 
great  war  fame  rests  upon  the  two  facts 
that  here  occurred  the  longest  and  blood¬ 
iest  seige  in  American  history  and  that 
here  occurred  the  most  spectacular  sin¬ 
gle  event  of  the  Civil  war,  the  explosion 
of  the  Burnside  mine.  For  ten  months 
the  two  armies  of  the  Civil  War,  the 
Army  of  Northern  Virginia  and  the  Army 
of  the  Potomac,  were  here  pitted  in  hero¬ 
ic  combat.  The  line  of  intrenchment  is 
still  practically  intact  through  a  great 
part  of  its  length,  and  at  the  Crater  it¬ 
self  a  well-preserved  battlefield,  scarred 
and  monumented,  is  spread  out  like  a 
map. 

The  Monuments 

Thus  the  Crater  battefield  offers  won¬ 
derful  opportunities  for  the  study  of  an 
actual  battle  of  the  Civil  War.  The 
fortifications  stand  untouched  and  the 
Crater  itself  remains  just  as  it  was  left 
when  the  Federal  dead  were  transferred 
from  it  to  the  National  cemetery  five 
miles  distant.  The  lines  of  the  two  arm¬ 
ies  were  so  close  together  that  a  stone 


might  be  tossed  from  one  into  the  other. 
The  line  of  the  excavation  of  the  Burn¬ 
side  Pennsylvania  miners  may  still  be 
traced  from  the  Federal  lines  to  the 
point  of  explosion  under  the  Elliott  Sal¬ 
ient.  The  open  fields  and  the  rolling  and 
wooded  country  still  show  the  line  of  the 
covered  way  by  which  the  Confederate 
troops  advanced  to  recapture  the  lines 
after  the  explosion.  On  the  Griffith  farm 
itself,  where  the  Crater  is  located  there 
is  a  wonderfully  interesting  museum  of 
the  war  relics.  Along  the  road  are 
markers  placed  by  the  A.  P.  Hill  Camp, 
of  Confederate  Veterans,  and  the  fields 
are  dotted  with  granite  monuments  and 
markers  erected  by  the  Northern  Posts. 
Especially  noticeable  are  the  stately 
monuments  of  Massachusetts  and  Penn¬ 
sylvania,  which  were  unveiled  with 
great  ceremony  by  the  governors  and 
veterans  of  those  States. 

Around  the  Lines 

In  the  immediate  vicinity  of  the  Crater 
lie  numerous  battle-fields,  and  a  drive 
“around  the  lines”  is  both  interesting 
and  instructive.  Two  features  of  inter¬ 
est  are  a  well-preserved  “bomb-proof” 
that  may  still  be  entered,  and  the  under¬ 
ground  passage  on  the  Davis  farm  not 
far  from  the  two  famous  forts  near  the 
Crater,  Fort  Mahone  (Fort  Hell)  and 
Fort  Sedgwick  (Fort  Damnation) 

Just  across  the  Jerusalem  Plank  Road 
from  this  underground  passage  is  the 
modest  marker  erected  to  commemorate 
the  citizen-soldiers’  fight  of  the  Ninth  of 
June,  1864. 

The  Four  Lines 

Roughly  speaking,  there  were  four  lines 
of  fortifications  around  Petersburg  in  the 
Civil  War,  two  Confederate  and  two 
Federal.  The  first  Confederate  line  was 
built  by  Captain  Dimmock,  and  this 
Dimmock  line  extends  from  the  river  at 
Skipwith  and  Puddledock  all  around  the 
city  back  to  the  river  at  the  Locks,  the 
batteries  being  numbered  from  one  to 
sixty-two.  When  the  Federals  took  Bat¬ 
tery  Number  Five,  General  Beauregard 
built  the  second  and  inner  line  of  Con¬ 
federate  fortifications.  The  Federal 
line  in  front  of  the  city  thus  embraced 
part  of  the  Dimmock  line,  but  it  was  ex¬ 
tended  to  the  Confederate  right  until 
both  lines  reached  for  miles  to  Hatcher’s 
Run.  This  Federal  line  was  thus  the 
third  circumvallation.  After  the  Cattle 
Raid,  however,  when  Rooney  Lee  made 
his  raid  to  the  rear  and  carried  off  thous¬ 
ands  of  cattle,  General  Grant  built  a 
fourth  line,  this  time  a  reverse  line  fac- 


19 


mg  to  the  rear  so  as  to  prevent  an  attack 
from  that  quarter.  This  reverse  line 
joined  the  Main  line  of  fortifications 
about  Fort  Fisher,  and  between  them 
ran  Grant’s  military  railroad.  A  sketch 
of  the  entrenched  lines  shows  between 
thirty  and  forty  forts  on  these  lines  of 
Grant’s  army  south  of  the  Appomattox. 

Three  Points  of  Interest 

As  the  Crater  and  the  monuments  form 
a  focus  of  interest  on  the  east  of  the  city, 
so  there  are  three  points  of  special  inter¬ 
est  on  the  west,  showing  the  gradual 
swing  of  the  battle  line  to  the  south  and 
west  until  Lee’s  lines  of  supplies  were  cut. 

The  first  of  these  is  Rohoic  Dam, 
where  the  pent  waters  of  a  stream  were 
used  to  strengthen  two  miles  of  the  worn 
Confederate  line.  This  same  device  had 
already  been  used  on  a  smaller  scale  in 
the  Gracie  Dam  on  the  east  of  the  city. 
The  second  and  more  famous  spot  is  Fort 
Gregg,  near  the  Central  Hospital,  the 
scene  of  one  of  the  most  gallant  defences 
in  all  history.  There  were  only  two  hund¬ 
red  and  fifty  Confederates  in  Fort  Gregg, 
but  when  it  fell  at  seven  o’clock  on  the 
fateful  morning  of  April  the  second,  1865, 
over  five  hundred  of  the  Federals  had 
fallen  before  it,  and  only  thirty  defend¬ 
ers  were  left.  The  third  and  most  sacred 
spot  is  shown  by  a  marker  on  the  Din- 
widdie  road  about  three  miles  from  the 
city,  where  General  A.  P.  Hill  was  killed 
while  riding  in  front  of  his  lines.  In 
memory  of  this  great  soldier,  who  gave 
his  life  for  the  city,  the  local  camp  of 
Confederate  Veterans  is  called  the  A.  P. 
Hill  Camp. 

Summary  of  The  Siege 

Petersburg  was  the  cardinal  point  of 
the  Civil  War  in  its  last  year.  All  the 
great  war  moves  hinged  here.  Even  the 
distant  military  movements  of  this  cru¬ 
cial  period  “pivoted”  on  the  Cockade 
City.  The  wide  sweep  of  the  subsidary 
operations  is  most  impressive.  Early’s 
raid  on  Washington  and  Sheridan’s  raid 
in  the  valley  were  both  undertaken  with 
reference  to  Petersburg  and  ended  at 
Petersburg.  Even  Sherman’s  march  to 
the  sea  became  finally  an  advance  on 
Petersburg,  and  Johnson’s  fight  at  Golds¬ 
boro  was  to  protect  Petersburg. 

The  Varied  Strategy 

But  it  is  the  varied  strategy  of  the 
siege  itself  that  makes  Petersburg  unique 
in  our  war  annals.  Surprise  attacks, 
sustained  assaults,  pitched  battles,  feints 


and  diversions,  an  underground  explos¬ 
ion  and  an  artificial  lake,  trench  and  sap — 
every  artifice  of  war  was  employed. 
The  Petersburg  terrain  was  the  arena  of 
the  greatest  “hammer  and  rapier”  duel 
in  history.  Grant’s  sledge-hammer  blow 
dented,  but  did  not  crush  the  defense, 
and  Lee’s  rapier  thrusts  could  reach  no 
vital  part  of  his  opponent’s  line.  Grant 
had  to  “move  by  the  left,”  and  Lee’s 
line  “stretched  so  long  as  to  break.” 
Surely  the  central  area  of  this  historic 
combat  should  be  preserved  intact.  Not 
Waterloo  nor  Gettysburg  is  more  sacred 
ground. 

The  Thirteen  Battles 

Of  the  thirteen  battles  outside  the 
breastworks  here  may  be  mentioned  in 
the  order  of  time  Rives’s  Salient,  Bat¬ 
tery  Number  Five,  Avery’s  Farm,  Wel¬ 
don  Railroad,  The  Crater,  Fort  Wads¬ 
worth,  Fort  Steadman,  Fort  Mahone, 
Fort  Gregg,  and  Fort  Fisher.  As  a  study 
of  masterly  attack  and  defense,  neither 
Yorktown  nor  Vicksburg  may  be  com¬ 
pared  to  Petersburg.  It  is  perhaps  only 
in  Wellington’s  Peninsular  Campaign 
that  such  bravery  and  persistence  in  at¬ 
tack  and  such  heroic  valor  and  devotion 
in  defense  may  be  found.  And  the  im¬ 
pression  that  remains  with  the  visitor 
fifty  years  after  the  battles  were  fought 
is  not  one  of  regret  or  apology,  but  rather 
one  of  pride  that  here,  where  their  fath¬ 
ers  achieved  their  independence,  two 
armies,  composed  of  the  sons  of  the  same 
indomitable  race,  held  the  world  in  awe 
and  Fate  itself  in  suspense  with  their 
Titanic  struggle. 

Civil  War  Hospitals 

There  were  seven  large  hospitals 
in  Petersburg  during  the  last  year 
of  the  war.  The  best  equipped  was 
the  Confederate  Hospital  on  Wash¬ 
ington  at  the  corner  of  Jones,  where 
a  large  tobacco  factory  was  utiliz¬ 
ed  for  this  purpose.  The  Fair 
Grounds  Hospital  was  in  West  End 
Park  and  Mcllwaine’s  Grove,  and 
there  was  also  a  hospital  establish¬ 
ed  later  in  Poplar  Lawn,  or  Cen¬ 
tral  Park. 

Four  other  hospitals  were  estab¬ 
lished  in  factories  or  warehouses; 
the  North  Carolina  in  Cameron’s 
factory,  the  Virginia  in  Watson’s 
and  McGill’s  factory,  the  South  Car¬ 
olina  in  Maclin’s  factory,  and  the 
Ladies’  Hospital  on  Bollingbrook 
and  Second  Streets.  These  four 
hospitals  had  to  be  abandoned  after 


the  first  month  of  the  siege  on  ac¬ 
count  of  the  shelling,  and  the  regu¬ 
lar  work  of  caring  for  the  sick  and 
wounded  fell  to  the  Confederate 
and  Fair  Grounds  hospitals,  while 
Poplar  Lawn  was  used  on  occasions. 
Dr.  John  Herbert  Claiborne  was  in 
charge  of  all  these  military  hos¬ 
pitals.  He  tells  how  he  had  authority 
to  draw  requisitions  “for  cotton 
yawn  and  snuff, ”  when  Confederate 
money  would  not  buy  the  necessary 
supplies  for  the  sick  and  wounded 
soldiers. 

A  Vivid  Picture 

Dr.  Claiborne  also  tells  of  the  day 
of  the  evacuation,  the  second  of 
April,  when  the  lines  were  broken  on 
the  Dinwiddie  Plank  Road  and  the 
fierce  fighting  was  going  on  at  Fort 
Gregg.  The  Federals  had  already 
advanced  near  the  Whitworth  House, 
now  the  Central  Hospital,  and  ran¬ 
dom  bullets  were  falling  in  the  Fair 
Grounds  hospital.  He  gives  a  vivid 
picture  of  the  convalescents  leaving 
the  danger  zone  and  pictures  the 
surgeons  and  attaches  “resorting  to 
leeward  of  the  large  trees”  for  pro¬ 
tection. 

Even  the  New  Market  building 
was  used  as  a  “half-way  hospital” 
for  cases  needing  prompt  treatment, 
and  citizens  still  tell  of  the  grisly 
sight  of  “piles  of  arms  and  legs” 
made  by  the  surgeons.  One  citizen, 
a  Civil  War  youngster,  tells  how  an 
amputated  arm,  thrown  carelessly 
aside  by  the  surgeon,  struck  him  and 
the  hand  grasped  his  leg  by  reflex 
action,  holding  fast  for  a  full  square 
during  his  wild  flight. 

Other  temporary  hospitals  were 
doubtless  established  from  time  to 
time.  On  the  day  of  the  Crater 
fight,  Mahone’s  field  hospital  was 
established  on  the  New  Road,  where 
it  crosses  Lieutenant  Run.  Mr.  Put¬ 
nam  Stith  and  Mr.  Richard  B.  Davis, 
a  brother  of  the  writer,  both  of 
whom  were  wounded  at  the  Crater, 
give  amusing  stories  of  the  day. 

Three  Hospital  Stories 

Mr.  Davis  says  that  at  this  New 
Road  bridge,  General  Mahone  gave 
orders  in  about  these  words:  “Boys, 
leave  everything  behind  but  your 
shirts  and  muskets,  for  we  are  going 
to  fight  like  h — 1  today.”  This  ac¬ 
count  is  in  strong  contrast  to  the 
language  of  Judge  D.  M.  Bernard, 
another  participant.  He  says:  “Here 
we  were  ordered  to  doff  our  knap¬ 


sacks,  et  cetera,  and  get  ready  for 
action.”  This  account  is  the  more 
polite,  but  the  verbatim  report  of 
Mr.  Davis  is  more  vivid. 

Mr.  Stith  tells  how  he  sat  down 
to  rest  behind  a  tree  on  Hannon’s 
Hill,  as  he  was  returning  wounded 
to  this  field  hospital,  and  heard  a 
groan  from  behind  another  tree, 
where  “Dick”  Davis  was  resting. 
Together  they  made  their  way  to 
the  ambulance  and  were  sent  to  the 
Brigade  hospital  at  Mcllwaine’s 
Grove,  where  Dr.  James  W.  Clai¬ 
borne  was  in  charge.  “In  less  than 
half  an  hour  after  we  got  there,” 
says  he,  “Professor  W.  T.  Davis, 
Dick’s  father,  arrived  with  a  bottle 
of  home-made  wine  in  each  hand — 
that  wine  saved  two  lives.” 

Another  Crater  incident,  told  by 
Judge  D.  M.  Bernard,  may  be  told 
here.  He  says  that  on  that  after¬ 
noon  he  saw  “the  happiest  man  I 
had  ever  seen  before  or  have  ever 
seen  since.”  His  hair,  face,  beard, 
clothes  were  matted  with  red  mud, 
but  “his  eyes  were  happy.”  He  had 
been  buried  and  stunned  by  the 
Crater  explosion,  and  when  he  came 
to  himself  he  thought  he  was  in  his 
grave.  After  hours  of  frantic  work, 
he  dug  his  way  out,  “and  he  was 
happy.” 

Origin  of  Memorial  Day 

The  Petersburg  Memorial  Associa¬ 
tion,  formed  by  the  ladies  of  Peters¬ 
burg  in  1866,  was  the  first  Memorial 
Association  in  America,  and  from  it 
sprang  the  movement  establishing 
the  National  Memorial  Day.  Mrs. 
John  A.  Logan,  of  Illinois,  visited 
Petersburg  some  years  after  the  war 
and  learned  of  the  memorial  exer¬ 
cises  of  the  9th  of  June.  She  in¬ 
terested  her  husband,  General  John 
A.  Logan,  a  member  of  Congress, 
and  he  in  turn  interested  the  Grand 
Army  of  the  Republic  and  Congress 
itself  in  the  movement  that  estab¬ 
lished  May  30th  as  National  Decora¬ 
tion  Day. 

Civil  War  Historians 

Several  Petersburg  writers  have 
done  valuable  work  in  Civil  War 
history,  especially  as  related  to 
Petersburg. 

Special  mention  is  made  elsewhere 
of  Mr.  Anthony  Keiley’s  brilliant  lit¬ 
tle  book,  “In  Vinculis,”  and  of  the 
eloquent  address  of  Captain  W. 


Gordon  McCabe  on  the  Battle  of  the 
Crater. 

First  after  these  should  be  named 
Mr.  George  S.  Bernard,  an  eminent 
lawyer  and  a  Confederate  veteran. 
He  collected  and  edited  a  valuable 
series  of  war  reminiscences  by  mem¬ 
bers  of  the  A.  P.  Hill  Camp  of 
Petersburg.  These  papers  were  pub¬ 
lished  in  1892  under  the  modest  title, 
‘‘War  Talks  of  Confederate  Vet¬ 
erans, and  the  book  is  a  monument 
to  his  ability  and  industry,  as  well 
as  a  striking  exhibit  of  the  heroism 
and  culture  of  these  Petersburg 
veterans.  In  any  history  of  Peters¬ 
burg  the  “War  Talks”  should  have 
more  than  passing  notice. 

“Confederate  War  Talks” 

Mr.  George  S.  Bernard  contributed 
the  paper  on  the  “Maryland  Cam¬ 
paign  of  1862,”  which  followed  Dr. 
J.  M.  Pilcher’s  account  of  the  “Early 
Days  of  the  War.”  Ex-Governor 
William  E.  Cameron  wrote  of  “Chan- 
cellorsville”  and  Mr.  Simon  Steward 
told  of  his  “Escape  From  Point 
Lookout.”  Mr.  John  R.  Turner  told 
the  part  taken  by  Mahone’s  Brigade 
in  the  “Battle  of  the  Wilderness.” 

Colonel  Fletcher  H.  Archer,  a 
veteran  of  the  Mexican  War  and 
colonel  in  command  of  the  Peters¬ 
burg  militia  on  the  9th  of  June, 
1864,  contributed  a  strong  paper  on 
“The  Defense  of  Petersburg,”  while 
Mr.  George  S.  Bernard  gave  a  valu¬ 
able  and  full  treatment  of  the  “Bat¬ 
tle  of  the  Crater.” 

Dr.  John  Herbert  Claiborne,  an 
eminent  physician  and  the  author  of 
“Seventy-five  Years  in  Old  Virginia,” 
gave  a  thrilling  account  of  the  Last 
Days  of  Lee  and  his  Paladins,  while 
Mr.  Freeman  W.  Jones  gave  a  mod¬ 
est  account  of  his  part  in  “A  Daring 
Expedition”  under  Captain  Read. 

Judge  J.  M.  Mullen  contributed 
the  final  formal  paper  in  an  interest¬ 
ing  account  of  the  Last  Days  of 
Johnston’s  Army.  There  are  also 
personal  experiences  by  Mr.  R.  B. 
Davis,  Judge  D.  M.  Bernard,  Mr. 
Putnam  Smith,  Captain  W.  E.  Hin¬ 
ton,  Mr.  J.  W.  Young,  Mr.  Wm. 
Cameron,  Hon.  C.  F.  Collier,  Mr.  R. 
A.  Martin,  Mrs.  David  Challender, 
Miss  Lossie  Hill,  Miss  Virginia 
Davidson,  Mrs.  Fanny  Waddell,  Mr. 
Hugh  R.  Smith,  Mr.  John  R.  Turner, 
Mr.  W.  E.  Smith,  Prof.  R.  W.  Jones, 
Mr.  W.  E.  Whitehorne,  Mr.  E.  Myers, 
Mr.  H.  V.  L.  Bird,  Judge  D.  A. 


Hinton,  Capt.  L.  L.  Marks,  Col.  E. 
M.  Field,  Maj.  W.  A.  Shepard,  Mr. 
W.  P.  Hoy,  Mr.  J.  T.  Barham,  Capt. 
J.  R.  Patterson,  Mr.  J.  E.  Spots- 
wood,  Col.  J.  P.  Minetree,  Mr.  J.  E. 
Rockwell  and  others. 

The  Petersburg  Historians 

Three  histories  of  Petersburg  have 
been  written,  and  each  represents  a 
serious  effort  to  tell  worthily  the 
chronicles  of  the  noble  city. 

Rev.  Minton  Thrift  seems  to  have 
been  the  first  to  attempt  the  task, 
and  his  incomplete  history,  written 
in  1845,  is  now  the  property  of  Mrs. 
Alexander.  The  style  of  the  work  is 
heavy,  but  it  shows  careful  study 
and  research. 

In  1878,  Rev.  E.  S.  Gregory  pub¬ 
lished  his  “Sketch  of  the  History  of 
Petersburg.”  This  work  is  written 
in  easy  and  flowing  style  and  is  well 
worthy  of  the  high  esteem  in  which 
it  is  held.  Mr.  Gregory  collected  his 
facts  with  care  and  presented  them 
in  attractive  form. 

Pollock’s  Guide 

The  most  comprehensive  of  these 
histories,  however,  is  the  two  hun¬ 
dred  and  fifty-page  “Guide  to  Peters¬ 
burg”  of  Mr.  Edward  Pollock,  an 
Englishman,  published  in  1884.  The 
book  is  both  “historical  and  indus¬ 
trial,”  less  than  one  hundred  pages 
being  devoted  to  the  history  of  the 
city,  and  the  remainder  to  sketches 
of  the  city’s  industries  and  organi¬ 
zations  and  to  advertisements.  One 
feature  of  the  book  that  adds  to  its 
interest  and  value  is  the  author’s 
plan  of  giving  a  sketch  of  his  adver¬ 
tisers,  and  many  of  the  prominent 
business  men  of  a  third  of  a  century 
ago  are  thus  described. 

PART  V— STORY  OF  THE  SIEGE 
OF  PETERSBURG 

The  Six  Accounts 

As  already  mentioned,  six  resi¬ 
dents  of  Petersburg  have  told  the 
story  of  the  siege  and  defense  of 
the  city.  These  have  done  it  so  well 
as  to  discourage  any  further  at¬ 
tempt.  Colonel  F.  H.  Archer’s  paper 
in  the  “War  Talks”  is  the  most 
graphic;  Captain  W.  G.  McCabe’s 
paper  in  the  Southern  Historical 
Papers  is  the  most  complete;  Mr. 
G.  S.  Bernard’s  in  the  “War  Talks” 
is  the  most  careful,  and  Mr.  An¬ 
thony  Keiley’s  in  “In  Vinculis”  is 


22 


the  most  brilliant.  The  outlines  given 
by  Mr.  E.  S.  Gregory  in  his  Sketch 
and  by  Mr.  Edward  Pollock  in  his 
Guide  are  compilations  rather  than 
independent  accounts. 

“Caviare  to  the  General” 

All  these  excellent  accounts,  how¬ 
ever,  leave  something  to  be  desired. 
They  are  either  too  technical  or  too 
diffuse,  too  deep  or  too  long,  for 
the  average  reader.  Thus  they  are 
“caviare  to  the  general,”  and  few 
of  our  people  read  these  admirable 
essays  today. 

The  Petersburg  Iliad 

It  ought  to  be  possible,  however, 
to  tell  this  modern  Iliad  in  brief 
and  simple  style,  and  such  a  story 
ought  to  interest  even  the  children 
of  the  city  and  thus  preserve  the 
memory  of  the  deeds  of  the  fathers 
for  the  coming  years.  The  military 
terms,  the  involved  strategy,  the 
complicated  movements,  the  details 
of  battles,  must  here  be  avoided  as 
carefully  as  the  rhetorical  outburst 
or  the  fine  language.  Only  the  gen¬ 
eral  plan  and  outline  and  the  spe¬ 
cific  names  and  dates  need  be  given. 
The  “terrain”  must  become  simply 
“the  lay  of  the  land,”  the  “lunette” 
must  be  simply  an  open  earthwork, 
the  “salient”  merely  a  fort.  In  fact, 
any  child  may  learn  the  plan  of  the 
siege  by  grasping  the  two  words, 
front  and  flank,  and  by  bending  a 
whiplash  till  it  meets  the  handle  of 
the  whip. 

The  Seventeen  Companies 

Until  the  last  twelve-month  of  the 
Civil  War,  Petersburg  was  not 
threatened,  although  there  was  a 
flurry  in  July,  1863,  caused  by  the 
rumor  that  a  Federal  gunboat  was 
coming  up  the  river.  During  all  this 
time  of  quiet,  however,  this  city  was 
sending  her  men  to  the  Confederate 
armies,  and  it  is  an  actual  fact  that 
out  of  a  total  white  population  of 
less  than  ten  thousand  Petersburg 
furnished  seventeen  companies  to  the 
Confederate  service.  These  seven¬ 
teen  companies  are  mentioned  by 
name  in  the  sketches  of  Gregory  and 
of  Pollock. 

The  First  Menace 

The  5th  of  May,  1864,  brought 
the  first  real  menace  of  war  to  Pe¬ 
tersburg.  General  Butler’s  army  of 


thirty  thousand  had  begun  a  move¬ 
ment  against  Petersburg  and  Rich¬ 
mond.  His  troops  landed  at  City 
Point  and  his  cavalry  advanced  from 
Suffolk.  General  Pickett  was  in 
charge  of  the  troops  in  Petersburg. 
Six  months  before  he  had  heard 
rumors  of  this  intended  advance 
and  urged  the  need  of  troops  and 
fortifications  at  Petersburg,  but  the 
city  was  still  unprepared  for  attack. 
However,  General  Pickett  with  some 
six  hundred  regulars  and  about  the 
same  number  of  militia  made  ready 
to  defend  the  city  on  this  5th  of 
May,  1864.  Fortunately  Butler  did 
not  attack  that  day,  and  on  the  next 
day  Haygood’s  brigade  arrived  and 
checked  Butler’s  advance  at  Port 
Walthall.  On  the  7th  day  of  May, 
Wise’s  Brigade  arrived  and  occupied 
the  lines  toward  City  Point. 

The  Month’s  Respite 

This  arrival  of  Wise’s  Brigade  gave 
the  city  a  needed  defense.  Proper 
lines  of  defense  were  prepared  and 
the  local  militia  was  soon  increased 
to  a  thousand.  The  tide  of  fighting, 
however,  turned  toward  the  north 
side  of  the  Appomattox,  and  most  of 
the  regulars  and  of  the  militia  were 
withdrawn  from  the  Petersburg  lines, 
only  a  few  companies  being  left  to 
guard  the  trenches  here.  General 
Henry  A.  Wise  was  in  command  of 
Petersburg  and  the  lines  around  it. 
In  this  connection,  the  following  per¬ 
sonal  letter  from  his  son,  the  late 
John  S.  Wise,  treasured  by  the  writer 
of  this  article,  will  prove  interesting: 

John  S.  Wise’s 

“Tell  Mrs.  Davis  that  I  say  no¬ 
body  can  praise  Petersburg  too  high¬ 
ly.  It  was  the  most  devoted,  un¬ 
selfish,  hospitable  place  on  earth. 
But  the  man  who  above  all  others 
ought  to  be  the  cherished  hero  of 
Petersburg  is  Henry  A.  Wise.” 

“Arriving  with  his  brigade  from 
Charleston  in  May,  1864,  he  reached 
there  in  time  to  meet  and  repel  the 
first  Federal  advance,  and  for  near¬ 
ly  a  month,  solitary  and  alone,  his 
brigade,  only  supported  by  home 
guards,  whipped  off  and  held  in 
check  the  Federals — 2,200  men  suc¬ 
cessfully  opposed  22,000  men  until 
General  Lee  could  succor  them,  and 
by  that  time  General  Wise  had  lost 
nine  out  of  twelve  of  his  field  offi¬ 
cers  and  nearly  half  of  his  brigade.” 

23 


“Nobody  except  Mahone  at  the 
Crater  ever  fought  for  Petersburg 
as  did  General  Wise,  and  when  they 
build  another  statue  to  those  who 
loved  Petersburg  best  and  fought 
hardest  for  her,  it  ought  to  be  to 
my  old  bald-eagle  daddy.” 

The  9th  of  June,  1864 

If  Butler’s  attack,  foiled  by  Gen¬ 
eral  Wise,  was  the  prologue  to  the 
city’s  war  drama,  there  was  yet  a 
grim  curtain-raiser  of  tragedy  be¬ 
fore  the  real  action  begun.  This 
was  Kautz’s  raid  on  the  9th  of  June, 
when  the  local  force  of  one  hundred 
and  twenty-five  men  had  to  bear  the 
brunt  of  the  attack  of  the  thirteen 
hundred  Federal  regulars.  This  he¬ 
roic  resistance  saved  the  city  by 
holding  the  enemy  until  help  came, 
but  the  success  was  won  at  heavy 
cost.  It  is  in  memory  of  these  de¬ 
voted  sons  that  Petersburg  annually 
keeps  her  Memorial  Day  on  the  9th 
of  June. 

The  General  Situation 

Grant’s  overland  campaign,  begun 
on  the  3d  of  May,  1864,  had  failed. 
After  the  battles  of  the  Wilderness, 
Spotsylvania  and  Cold  Harbor,  he 
was  still  unable  to  drive  Lee  from 
the  fortifications  of  Richmond.  Cold 
Harbor  was  fought  on  the  3d  of 
June,  and  now  Grant  determined  to 
move  on  Petersburg  and  thus  attack 
Richmond  from  the  south.  The 
movement  to  the  south  was  begun  at 
once,  and  by  the  16th  of  June  all 
Grant’s  army  was  south  of  the  James 
River.  Thus  the  Federal  Army  of 
the  Potomac  was  being  launched 
against  Petersburg. 

Kautz’s  Raid 

In  the  meantime,  before  Grant’s 
forces  reached  Petersburg  or  were 
known  to  be  about  to  attack  it,  part 
of  General  Butler’s  force  made  the 
9th  of  June  attack,  known  as  Kautz’s 
Raid.  The  Federal  forces  consisted 
of  an  infantry  force  of  five  or  six 
thousand  men  under  General  Gil¬ 
more  that  moved  against  the  Confed¬ 
erate  lines  near  the  river,  and  a  cav¬ 
alry  force  of  thirteen  hundred  men 
with  four  guns  that  attempted  to 
capture  the  city  by  a  surprise  attack 
from  the  Jerusalem  Plank  Road. 

The  infantry  attack  under  Gil¬ 
more  was  not  seriously  pressed,  as 
he  did  not  assault  the  lines  in  front 


of  him,  reporting  them  as  too  strong. 
Kautz’s  cavalry,  however,  swept 
around  without  resistance.  Reach¬ 
ing  the  plank  road,  they  advanced 
to  capture  the  city.  All  went  well 
until  they  reached  the  Rives  farm. 

The  Petersburg  Militia 

As  already  explained,  the  regu¬ 
lars  and  most  of  the  militia  had  been 
withdrawn  from  Petersburg  for  ser¬ 
vice  elsewhere.  The  small  force  left 
in  the  trenches  had  spent  thirty  days 
in  drilling,  guard  duty  and  camp  life. 
They  had  no  idea  of  the  impending 
attack.  When  the  news  of  the  dan¬ 
ger  came  through  a  note  from  Colo¬ 
nel  Harrison,  the  long  roll  was  or¬ 
dered,  and  the  old  men  and  bojrs  and 
absentees  of  the  militia  were  hur¬ 
riedly  summoned  from  Petersburg. 
The  six  companies  of  militia  that  ar¬ 
rived  in  time  to  bear  the  brunt  of 
Kautz’s  attack  had  a  total  strength 
of  one  hundred  and  twenty-five  men. 
They  had  to  face  a  force  ten  times 
their  number. 

The  Rives  Farm  Fight 

The  fight  began  at  noon  on  the 
9th  of  June  on  the  Jerusalem  Plank 
Road,  a  mile  and  a  half  from  Peters¬ 
burg.  Our  men  occupied  an  open 
earth-work,  with  low  breastworks 
running  out  on  either  side.  The  first 
cavalry  charge  was  driven  back,  and 
the  one  gun  of  Sturdivant’s  battery 
that  had  been  hurried  up  with  six 
men  opened  on  the  enemy.  The  lit¬ 
tle  handful  could  hope  for  no  help. 
On  one  side  was  a  gap  of  a  mile  to 
the  next  support,  and  on  the  other 
a  gap  of  four  miles  to  the  river.  The 
fate  of  Petersburg  depended  on  their 
stubborn  resistance,  as  they  knew. 
What  they  did  not  know  was  that 
the  fate  of  Richmond  and  of  Lee’s 
army  depended  on  them.  It  was  a 
Thermopylae  of  the  Civil  War. 

Two  Hours  of  Heroism 

The  first  charge  of  Kautz’s  cav¬ 
alry  was  repulsed  by  the  fire  of 
Archer’s  men.  Kautz  then  dis¬ 
mounted  two  regiments  of  his  cav¬ 
alry  and  began  to  attack  from  left 
and  right.  Our  men  twice  repulsed 
the  attacks  and  were  commanded  to 
fall  back  only  after  a  gap  in  their 
lines  had  been  penetrated  and  they 
had  been  flanked  on  both  sides. 
“We  fought  them,”  says  Anthony 


24 


Keiley,  “till  we  were  so  surrounded 
that  two  men  nearest  to  me  were 
shot  in  the  back  while  facing  the 
line  of  original  approach;  till  our 
camp  in  rear  of  the  works  was 
full  of  the  foe;  till  the  noblest  blood 
of  our  city  stained  the  breastworks/’ 
Then  at  last  they  retreated,  with  a 
loss  of  sixty-five  out  of  one  hundred 
and  twenty-five — more  than  half.  In 
his  report,  General  Colston  says: 
“They  stood  to  the  breastworks  like 
veterans  and  did  not  fall  back  until 
ordered  to  do  so,  when  they  were 
surrounded  on  three  sides  and  al¬ 
most  entirely  cut  off.  Had  they  re¬ 
treated  five  or  ten  minutes  sooner, 
the  city  would  have  been  in  the 
enemy’s  hands.” 

The  City  Saved 

Thus  it  was  the  stubborn  last  half- 
hour  of  this  fight  that  saved  Peters¬ 
burg.  Kautz’s  forces  then  advanced 
in  two  divisions.  The  main  division 
turned  up  the  New  Road  to  Peters¬ 
burg,  the  other  proceeded  toward 
Blandford.  Sturdivant’s  battery 
checked  the  advance  to  Blandford, 
and  Graham’s  battery  reached  the 
Heights  just  in  time  to  check  the 
New  Road  advance  at  the  foot  of 
Waterworks  Hill  until  Bearing’s  cav¬ 
alry  arrived  and  drove  the  enemy 
back. 

In  his  report,  General  Wise  says 
of  the  Petersburg  militiamen:  “If 
Sturdivant’s  battery  lost  one  gun,  a 
better  one  was  captured  and  another 
disabled — and  if  they  lost  half  a  mile 
of  ground,  they  gained  a  half  hour 
of  time  and  saved  their  beloved 
city.” 

Grant’s  Surprise  Attack 

As  Butler  made  his  surprise  at¬ 
tack  on  the  9th  of  June,  so  Gen¬ 
eral  Grant  himself  planned  the  sec¬ 
ond  surprise  attack  on  the  15th  of 
June.  This  time  the  salvation  of  the 
city  was  due  to  Grant’s  secretiveness 
and  to  two  accidents — a  short  pon¬ 
toon  bridge  and  an  incorrect  map. 

General  Lee  did  not  learn  of 
Grant’s  move  to  the  south  until  the 
13th  of  June.  Even  then  he  did  not 
know  Grant’s  plan  against  Peters¬ 
burg,  but  expected  a  direct  advance 
on  Richmond  by  the  river  routes. 
Hence  Petersburg  was  still  weakly 
garrisoned  and  fortified,  and,  as 
Swinton  says,  “was  the  open  prize 
of  the  first  captor.” 


“Saved  by  Accidents” 

The  Federal  troops  under  Smith 
crossed  the  Appomattox  at  Point  of 
Rocks  on  the  night  of  June  14th 
and  advanced  against  Petersburg. 
Many  more  troops  would  have 
joined  in  the  attack,  but  the  main 
Federal  forces  had  lost  a  day  by 
waiting  for  a  longer  pontoon  bridge. 
Hancock’s  Corps,  however,  had  been 
ferried  across  in  transports,  and  they 
would  have  arrived  in  time  to  join 
Smith  and  gain  the  city  if  Hancock 
had  not  been  misled  by  an  incorrect 
map.  Even  in  spite  of  this,  Hancock 
would  have  arrived  in  time  had  he 
known  Petersburg  was  his  objective, 
but  Grant  had  not  communicated  the 
plan  to  him.  Hence  he  arrived  only 
after  Smith  had  made  his  attack  on 
the  15th.  He  then  offered  to  join 
Smith  in  a  concerted  attack.  As  the 
hour  was  late,  however,  Smith  con¬ 
tented  himself  with  holding  the  part 
of  the  Confederate  lines  already  cap¬ 
tured,  and  thus  gave  Lee  time  to 
pour  reinforcements  into  Petersburg 
during  the  night. 

The  Period  of  Assaults 

Swinton  devotes  a  chapter  to  the 
two  weeks  following  the  surprise 
attack  of  the  15th  of  June,  calling 
this  the  “period  of  assaults.”  They 
were  two  weeks  of  exhausting  ef¬ 
fort  on  both  sides.  In  the  first  four 
days  of  assault,  from  Wednesday  to 
Saturday,  the  Federals  lost  more 
than  ten  thousand  men.  It  was 
three  days  later,  on  the  21st  of  June, 
that  Grant  began  his  attempt  to  ex¬ 
tend  his  left  and  cut  Lee’s  communi¬ 
cations.  This  brought  on  the  action 
of  the  22d  of  June  and  the  first  bat¬ 
tle  of  Reams’s  Station.  In  both  of 
these  actions  the  Union  advance  .was 
sharply  checked,  but  though  driven 
back  from  the  Weldon  Railroad,  the 
Union  forces  were  firmly  established 
across  the  Jerusalem  Plank  Road. 

The  July  Situation 

By  the  1st  of  July  both  armies 
were  entrenched  before  Petersburg. 
Grant’s  base  was  City  Point,  with 
Butler  at  Bermuda  Hundred  and 
Foster  at  Deep  Bottom,  ten  miles 
south  of  Richmond.  Grant’s  lines 
before  Petersburg  extended  from  the 
river  on  the  east  toward  the  Wel¬ 
don  Railroad  on  the  south.  Along 
this  whole  line  Lee’s  army  faced 
the  Union  host,  protecting  the  Rich- 


25 


mond  and  Petersburg  Railroad  from 
attack  on  the  north  of  the  Appo¬ 
mattox,  enveloping  Petersburg  on  the 
east  and  south,  and  stretching  west¬ 
ward  beyond  the  flanks  of  the  Union 
Army.  Thus  the  siege  of  Petersburg 
was  not  really  a  siege  or  blockade, 
as  its  lines  of  communications  were 
open.  It  was  rather  a  partial  invest¬ 
ment  or  “watchful  waiting,”  as  in 
the  siege  of  Sebastopol. 

The  whole  month  of  July  was  filled 
with  the  work  of  entrenchment.  Both 
of  the  armies  “dug  themselves  in” 
and  by  the  close  of  the  month  the 
systems  of  earthworks  covered  the 
front.  It  was  now  open  to  Grant 
either  to  try  a  direct  assault  or  to 
attack  by  the  flank.  He  chose  first 
a  direct  assault  on  Burnside’s  front, 
through  the  exploding  of  a  mine. 

The  Crater — July  30th. 

This  Federal  attack  on  the  30th 
of  July,  called  by  the  Confederates 
the  Crater  Battle  and  by  Swinton 
the  Mine  Fiasco,  resulted  in  a  Union 
defeat  and  greatly  cheered  the 
Southern  army. 

Burnside’s  Pennsylvania  miners 
had  dug  a  mine  under  an  advanced 
fort  of  the  Southern  line,  about  half 
a  mile  from  Blandford  Cemetery, 
called  the  Elliott  Salient.  The  plan 
was  to  make  an  opening  for  the 
Union  forces  by  the  explosion  of  this 
mine  and  to  advance  through  this 
breach  into  Petersburg.  Five  of  the 
eight  divisions  of  the  Confederate 
army  had  been  drawn  away  from 
Petersburg  by  a  movement  of  the 
Union  armies  in  the  direction  of 
Richmond,  so  that  on  the  morning  of 
July  30th  General  Lee  had  only  thir¬ 
teen  thousand  men  to  defend  the 
city,  while  Grant  had  sixty  thousand 
massed  for  the  attack. 

The  mine  was  to  be  exploded  at 
half  past  four  in  the  morning.  At 
first  it  failed  to  explode,  but  Lieu¬ 
tenant  Douty  and  Sergeant  Rees 
volunteered  to  relight  the  fuse,  and 
the  mine  exploded  at  a  quarter  to 
five,  destroying  the  “Elliott  Salient” 
and  opening  the  way  to  Petersburg. 

The  Way  Open 

Then  began  the  Federal  advance, 
but  as  soon  as  the  attacking  column 
advanced  beyond  the  Crater  it  was 
met  by  the  fire  of  Confederate  bat¬ 
teries  from  left  and  right  and  the 
Federal  troops  sought  refuge  in  the 
Crater,  although  a  prompt  advance 


would  have  carried  Cemetery  Ridge 
and  won  the  city.  As  other  troops 
were  thrown  in  they  huddled  into  the 
Crater  or  sought  cover  behind  the  ad¬ 
jacent  breastworks.  This  caused 
great  confusion.  A  division  of  negro 
troops  made  an  advance  toward  the 
crest,  but  were  driven  back  and  re¬ 
tired  through  the  troops  in  the  Crater 
back  to  their  original  lines.  During 
all  this  time  the  way  to  Petersburg 
was  open,  and  only  the  fires  of  the 
batteries  to  right  and  left  kept  back 
the  advance.  There  were  literally 
no  troops  between  the  Crater  and 
Petersburg. 

Mahone’s  Brigade 

When  the  mine  exploded,  Ma¬ 
hone’s  brigade  was  west  of  the 
Willcox  farm,  some  two  miles  dis¬ 
tant.  General  Mahone  received  or¬ 
ders  to  send  two  of  his  brigades 
a  little  after  6  o’clock,  when  the 
Crater  had  been  in  the  enemy’s 
possession  for  more  than  an  hour. 
The  men  of  Mahone’s  Virginia  bri¬ 
gade  and  Wright’s  Georgia  brigade 
dropped  back  from  the  lines  and 
marched  through  the  ravines  and 
up  the  covered  way,  forming  for 
the  attack  in  a  ravine  about  two 
hundred  yards  northwest  of  the 
Crater.  General  Mahone  himself 
directed  the  attack  and  the  advance 
was  made  by  the  Virginia  brigade 
under  General  Weisiger.  This  splen¬ 
did  charge  recaptured  the  lines  to 
the  north  of  the  Crater  about  9 
o’clock.  An  hour  later  Wright’s  bri¬ 
gade  advanced  from  the  same  ravine 
against  the  Federals  south  of  the 
Crater,  but  the  attempt  failed  and 
they  took  shelter  with  the  Virginians 
in  the  works  already  recaptured. 
Wright’s  brigade  made  another  un¬ 
successful  attempt  against  the  works 
about  11  o’clock,  and  it  was  not  until 
after  1  o’clock  that  Saunders’s  Ala¬ 
bama  brigade  charged  and  captured 
the  Crater  itself.  The  Federal  loss 
was  over  five  thousand  men,  and 
Grant  justly  called  the  Crater  fight 
“a  miserable  affair”  for  the  Federal 
troops. 

The  July  and  August  Diversions 

Early  in  July,  before  the  Crater 
Battle,  Lee  had  tried  to  weaken  the 
Union  forces  before  the  city  by  the 
diversion  of  Early’s  Raid.  He  hoped 
that  Early’s  dash  down  the  Valley 
on  Washington  would  cause  Grant 
to  send  several  of  his  army  corps  to 


defend  it.  Early  got  within  a  few 
miles  of  Washington,  but  had  to  re¬ 
treat,  and  Grant  sent  only  his  Sixth 
Corps  to  aid  in  the  defense  of  the 
capital. 

After  the  Crater  Battle,  Grant  in 
turn  tried  a  diversion.  Early  in 
August  he  sent  Sheridan  on  his  raid 
down  the  Valley  of  Virginia  to 
weaken  Lee’s  forces  and  to  cut  off 
his  provisions.  This  raid  was  suc¬ 
cessful,  but  Early’s  men,  driven  out 
of  the  Valley,  joined  Lee’s  forces  at 
Petersburg. 

The  Two  Railroads 

Thus  there  was  a  stalemate  be¬ 
fore  the  lines  of  Petersburg.  Grant 
found  that  the  surprise  attack  had 
failed,  the  sustained  assaults  had 
failed,  the  special  attack  had  failed, 
the  diversion  plan  had  failed.  Great 
soldier  as  he  was,  he  knew  that  a 
master  of  strategy  confronted  him, 
and  he  wisely  chose  the  process  of 
attrition  and  of  gradual  advance  on 
the  Confederate  lines  of  supplies. 

Lee’s  army  before  Petersburg 
was  supplied  by  two  railroads,  the 
Weldon  Railroad  (now  the  Atlantic 
Coast  Line)  and  the  Southside  Rail¬ 
road  (now  the  Norfolk  and  West¬ 
ern).  Grant  now  began  hammering 
on  these  two  lines  of  supply. 

Weldon  Railroad  Lost 

Although  Lee  had  anticipated  this 
move  and  although  the  battles  were 
hotly  contested  and  marked  by  bril¬ 
liant  fighting,  Grant  had  the  Weldon 
Railroad  by  the  end  of  August. 
There  were  four  fierce  battles  for 
this  prize,  from  the  18th  of  August 
to  the  second  battle  of  Reams’s 
Station  on  the  25th  of  August,  when 
the  Confederates  won  a  brilliant  vic¬ 
tory.  The  Union  armies  had  the 
railroad,  however,  at  a  price  of  seven 
thousand  men,  thus  cutting  off  Lee’s 
direct  supplies  from  the  South.  But 
Lee  still  had  his  main  line  of  sup¬ 
plies  by  the  Southside  Railroad  with 
his  base  at  Burkeville. 

Hatcher’s  Run 

Grant  continued  to  “extend  his 
left,”  and  October  was  ushered  in 
with  the  “Battles  of  the  Jones 
House.”  Then  followed  almost  a 
month  of  minor  fights,  until  Grant’s 
final  effort  to  capture  the  Southside 
Railroad  before  the  coming  of  win¬ 
ter.  This  was  the  Battle  of  Hatch¬ 


er’s  Run,  one  of  the  main  engage¬ 
ments  in  Grant’s  turning  movement. 
His  plan  was  to  turn  Lee’s  extreme 
right  and  gain  the  railroad.  Three 
corps  of  the  Army  of  the  Potomac 
took  part,  only  enough  men  being 
left  behind  to  hold  the  Petersburg 
lines.  The  attempt  failed,  after 
very  heavy  fighting,  and  Grant  set¬ 
tled  down  to  extend  his  line  of  for¬ 
tifications  to  Hatcher’s  Run. 

Two  Winter  Efforts 

In  December  the  Union  forces  de¬ 
stroyed  the  Weldon  Railroad  nearly 
to  the  North  Carolina  line,  but  there 
was  no  further  serious  attempt 
against  Lee’s  right  and  the  South- 
side  Railroad  until  early  in  Febru¬ 
ary.  This  new  attempt  was  defeated 
by  the  Confederates,  and  the  armies 
settled  down  in  winter  quarters. 

The  Spring  Situation 

With  the  opening  of  the  spring 
campaign,  the  defense  of  Petersburg 
becomes  even  more  important.  It 
is  now  the  objective  not  only  of  the 
Army  of  the  Potomac,  but  also  of 
Sherman  and  his  hosts  marching 
north  from  Savannah.  It  is  a  won¬ 
derful  play  of  “team  work”  in  war. 
In  North  Carolina  Sherman  was 
fighting  Johnston  in  order  to  reach 
and  join  Grant  at  Petersburg,  while 
Grant  was  reinaining  inactive  at 
Petersburg,  lest  Lee  should  leave 
Petersburg  to  make  a  junction  with 
Johnston  elsewhere.  Sheridan  with 
his  forces  from  the  Valley  was  also 
hastening  to  Petersburg,  and  thus  all 
the  Northern  forces  were  converging 
on  this  devoted  city.  Sheridan 
reached  Petersburg  with  his  troops 
on  March  26th,  and  Sherman  himself 
arrived  a  few  days  later,  leaving  his 
army  at  Goldsboro,  N.  C. 

The  Battle  of  Fort  Steadman 

Lee  had  now  resolved  to  leave 
Petersburg  and  Richmond  and  try  to 
unite  with  Johnston  on  the  Danville 
line.  Rations  were  accumulated  at 
Amelia  C.  H.  In  order  to  open  the 
way  to  Burkeville  he  struck  toward 
City  Point  on  March  25th.  Thus  the 
attack  on  Fort  Steadman  was  Lee’s 
attempt  to  open  the  way  for  a  re¬ 
treat  by  the  Cox  Road.  By  striking 
this  blow  at  the  fort  just  at  Peters¬ 
burg  he  hoped  to  cause  Grant  to 
draw  in  his  troops  from  his  left  flank. 
“The  attack  was  to  be  made  by  two 


27 


divisions  under  Gordon  with  all  the 
troops  available  to  support  it.”  Gor¬ 
don’s  brilliant  attack  was  successful, 
but  from  lack  of  support  it  did  not 
bring  the  result  hoped  for.  It  was 
the  last  serious  initiative  on  the  part 
of  the  Army  of  Northern  Virginia 
before  Petersburg,  for  now  it  was 
Grant’s  turn  to  attack. 

The  Battle  of  Five  Forks 

Grant’s  final  successful  attempt  in 
his  turning  movement  was  the  Bat¬ 
tle  of  Five  Forks.  The  Southside 
Railroad  and  Cox’s  Road,  the  supply 
line  and  the  retreat  line  of  Lee’s 
army,  were  again  his  objective.  But 
now  the  Confederate  forces,  reduced 
in  numbers  and  spread  over  a  length 
of  line  almost  impossible  to  hold, 
had  to  meet  the  superior  numbers  of 
Grant  increased  by  the  soldiers  of 
Sheridan.  Worst  of  all,  Lee  had  to 
meet  the  massed  attack  of  the  Union 
armies  without  recalling  Long- 
street’s  two  divisions  guarding  Rich¬ 
mond  or  Mahone’s  division  of  Hill’s 
corps  before  Bermuda  Hundred,  for 
he  did  not  know  that  Grant  had 
withdrawn  three  of  his  four  divisions 
before  Richmond  for  the  attempt  on 
the  Petersburg  lines. 

“Aggressive  to  the  Last” 

But  Lee  was  “Aggressive  to  the 
Last,”  as  Swinton  says.  Taking  all 
the  troops  he  dared  from  the  Peters¬ 
burg  lines  and  leaving  only  some  six 
thousand  men  to  guard  the  entrench¬ 
ments,  he  hurried  with  some  fifteen 
thousand  men  to  meet  the  attack  on 
his  right. 

The  First  of  April,  1865 

The  armies  faced  each  other  at 
Hatcher’s  Run,  but  the  heavy  rains 
of  the  30th  of  March  made  Grant 
unwilling  to  open  operations.  Taking 
the  initiative,  Lee  attacked  the  Union 
lines  fiercely.  This  final  important 
battle  of  the  Confederate  army  was 
stubbornly  contested  and  at  times 
seemed  to  give  promise  of  success, 
but  it  ended  in  Lee’s  defeat,  with 
heavy  losses  on  both  sides.  The 
Southside  Road  and  Cox’s  Road  were 
both  in  Grant’s  hands,  and  Lee  now 
held  only  a  half-moon  of  trenches 
and  forts  encircling  Petersburg  to 
the  Appomattox  River  on  each  side. 

Fort  Gregg 

One  of  the  most  gallant  defenses 


of  history  was  that  of  Fort  Gregg, 
near  the  Central  Hospital.  As  the 
Union  forces  advanced  from  Five 
Forks  and  Dinwiddie  Court  House 
and  reached  the  lines  just  around 
Petersburg,  a  Union  division  at¬ 
tempted  to  break  through  to  the 
city.  There  were  only  two  hundred 
and  fifty  men  to  defend  Fort  Gregg, 
but  before  it  fell  at  7  o’clock  on 
the  morning  of  April  2d  over  five 
hundred  of  the  enemy  had  fallen  and 
only  thirty  defenders  were  left.  And 
the  inner  line  around  the  city  still 
held  firm. 

Death  of  A.  P.  Hill 

About  10  o’clock  on  April  2d 
Longstreet  at  last  arrived  from 
Richmond  with  several  brigades,  and 
soon  afterward  General  A.  P.  Hill 
struck  the  last  blow  for  the  Army 
of  Northern  Virginia  in  the  siege. 
His  attack  on  the  Ninth  Corps  was 
so  successful  that  the  Union  garri¬ 
son  of  City  Point  had  to  be  ordered 
to  its  support.  But  General  A.  P. 
Hill  was  killed  while  riding  in  front 
of  his  lines.  The  spot  where  he  fell, 
a  few  miles  from  the  city,  has  a 
marker  placed  by  the  Petersburg 
Sons  of  Veterans,  and  the  local  or¬ 
ganization  of  Confederate  Veterans 
is  the  “A.  P.  Hill  Camp,”  in  memory 
of  the  great  leader  that  gave  his  life 
for  the  city. 

Evacuation  and  Retreat 

Lee  still  held  his  cordon  around 
Petersburg,  but  the  lack  of  supplies 
made  retreat  inevitable.  The  only 
line  of  retreat  open  was  up  the  north 
bank  of  the  Appomattox.  With  won¬ 
derful  skill,  on  the  night  of  April  2d, 
he  withdrew  his  forces  from  Peters¬ 
burg,  from  Bermuda  Hundred,  and 
from  Richmond,  and  brought  them 
together  at  Chesterfield  Court 
House.  At  dawn  Lee’s  army  was  six¬ 
teen  miles  from  Petersburg. 

Lee’s  forces  retreated  from  Pe¬ 
tersburg  Sunday  night,  April  2d, 
over  four  bridges — the  Pocahontas 
Bridge,  the  Railroad  Bridge,  the  Pon¬ 
toon  Bridge,  and  Campbell’s  Bridge. 
The  city  was  not  taken  by  assault, 
as  is  asserted  in  many  school  his¬ 
tories.  Swinton  tells  the  true  story: 
“When  in  the  gray  dawn  of  Mon¬ 
day,  April  3d,  the  skirmishers  ad¬ 
vanced  from  the  lines  before  Peters¬ 
burg,  the  city  was  found  to  be 
evacuated.” 


28 


Surrender  of  Petersburg 

The  city  was  formally  surrendered 
to  General  Grant  on  the  3d  of  April, 
1865,  by  a  committee  of  three, 
Mayor  W.  W.  Townes,  Mr.  D’Arcy 
Paul  and  Mr.  Charles  F.  Collier,  act¬ 
ing  in  accordance  with  a  formal  reso¬ 
lution  passed  by  the  Common  Coun¬ 
cil,  of  which  Mr.  J.  Pinckney  Wil¬ 
liamson  is  the  only  surviving  mem¬ 
ber. 

Mr.  Townes  was  mayor  for  many 
years.  Mr.  Collier  also  was  later  an 
honored  mayor,  and  Mr.  D’Arcy 
Paul’s  name  is  dear  to  every  citi¬ 
zen  for  his  philanthropy  and  for  his 
public  services.  He  founded  and 
endowed  the  Methodist  Female  Or¬ 
phan  Asylum. 

The  Amelia  Tragedy 

All  day  during  May  3d  Lee’s  forces 
hastened  to  Amelia  Court  House — 
twenty  thousand  gaunt  veterans  that 
might  still  hope  to  cut  their  way 
through  and  unite  with  Johnston’s 
forces  in  North  Carolina.  It  was  to 
Amelia  that  Lee  has  ordered  supplies 
to  be  sent.  “Here  a  dire  and  un¬ 
looked-for  anguish  befell  him.”  He 
found  that  the  train  of  cars  loaded 
with  provisions  for  his  army  had 
reached  Amelia  Court  House  the  aft¬ 
ernoon  before,  but  through  a  mistake 
had  been  sent  on  to  Richmond  and 
was  in  the  hands  of  the  enemy. 

Surrender  at  Appomattox 

This  was  the  real  end.  The  army 
could  not  be  held  together  without 
food.  “Half  of  the  force,”  says 
Swinton,  “was  broken  up  into  for¬ 
aging  parties.”  There  was  no  fur¬ 
ther  hope  to  strike  the  foe  in  de¬ 
tail  and  thus  win  to  safety.  The 
retreat  became  an  attempt  to  es¬ 
cape,  and  the  surrender  at  Appo¬ 
mattox  on  the  9th  of  April,  after 
Gordon’s  brave  attempt  to  cut  his 
way  through,  was  a  surrender  to 
starvation.  After  Amelia  there  is 
only  the  record  of  the  death-throes 
of  the  Army  of  Northern  Virginia, 
“which,  vital  in  all  its  parts,  died 
only  with  its  annihilation.” 

*  *  *  * 

The  Spirit  of  Petersburg 

Thus  three  centuries  of  the  strategy 
of  war  and  of  the  arts  of  peace  have  left 
their  varying  memorials  here,  and  thus 
one  may  strip  off  the  decades  and  the 
centuries,  layer  after  layer  of  time,  yet 


in  each  layer  of  time,  in  each  decade  or 
each  century,  there  abides  still  the  un¬ 
changing  spirit  of  a  sturdy,  brave,  homo¬ 
geneous  people.  The  qualities  that  gave 
Petersburg  vitality  and  initative  and 
wealth  and  leadership  in  the  past,  still 
keep  the  historic  city  in  the  front  rank 
of  Virginia  communities.  The  deeds  of 
the  fathers  have  not  been  a  matter  of 
mere  pride  but  a  call  and  an  inspiration 
to  equal  deeds.  Thus  in  the  midst  of  the 
bustle  of  the  active  life  of  today,  the  city 
keeps  a  dignity  and  beauty  that  has 
something  of  the  charm  of  an  elder  and 
a  better  day. 

A  Notable  Fact 

But  this  is  not  the  specific  charm  of 
the  city,  for  its  distinguishing  character¬ 
istic  is  yet  to  be  mentioned.  Not  only 
does  the  historic  city  keep  its  vitality, 
after  having  had  an  active  share  in  the 
notable  deeds  of  America  and  after  hav¬ 
ing  been  an  integral  part  of  the  history 
of  the  section  and  of  the  nation.  Not 
only  does  it  have  the  dignity  and  inspira¬ 
tion  of  a  heroic  past  and  the  energy  and 
activity  of  a  busy  city  of  wealth  and  en¬ 
terprise  today.  The  most  striking  fact 
about  the  city  is  the  unbroken  continuity 
of  its  historic  life,  which  is  the  sure  guar¬ 
antee  of  its  continued  loyalty  to  the 
principles  and  standards  that  have  con¬ 
tributed  to  its  primacy  in  the  past. 
Its  people  are  the  offspring  of  the  men 
and  women  that  have  made  it  famous. 

If  a  list  were  made  of  the  names  of  the 
citizens  mentioned  in  this  sketch  of  three 
hundred  years,  it  would  be  found  that 
every  one  of  these  names  is  a  present  and 
living  force  in  the  community  of  today. 

Of  what  other  city  in  America  may 
this  be  said? 

The  Appomattox  River 

So  runs  the  story  of  Petersburg 
and  the  fifteen  miles  of  river  history. 
As  the  first  English  expedition  across 
the  mountains  started  from  Bellevue 
at  one  end  of  this  line,  so  the  latest 
American  shipments  of  munitions 
overseas  go  from  City  Point  and 
Hopewell  at  the  other  end.  And  the 
stretch  of  river  between  has  mir¬ 
rored  in  its  placid  waters  all  the 
sunshine  and  all  the  gloom  of  Ameri¬ 
can  history. 

“The  Reverend  Sire” 

If  one  might  personify  the  Appo¬ 
mattox,  as  Milton  did  the  Cam,  what 
a  “reverend  sire”  he  would  be  “with 
garments  weedy  and  with  bonnet 
sedge,”  and  what  moving  tales  he 
could  tell.  From  the  seventeenth 
century  he  would  give  the  picture 


..  of  Batte  and  his  gallant  companions 
setting  out  from  Fort  Henry  for  their 
Western  Expedition.  From  the 
eighteenth  century  he  would  tell  of 
courtly  Colonel  Byrd  and  his  jour¬ 
neys  to  the  Dividing  Line  and  to  the 
Land  of  Eden;  of  the  stout  Colonials 
and  their  grapple  with  the  British 
at  Blandford  and  Pocahontas  Bridge. 
From  the  nineteenth  century  he 
would  describe  McRae  and  his  brave 


boys  of  1812,  and  tell  of  Lee  and 
his  gaunt  veterans  in  the  sixties. 
From  the  twentieth  century  he  would 
tell  us  of  the  munition  plants  of 
Hopewell  and  the  great  cantonment 
of  Camp  Lee  and  all  the  varied  ac¬ 
tivities  of  the  World  War.  But  in 
each  century  he  would  tell  us  most 
of  the  devoted  and  noble  people  that 
lived  their  lives  and  fought  their  bat¬ 
tles  here  for  home  and  fireside. 


30 


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